


Honey & Yarrow

by katyazeroni



Category: RuPaul's Drag Race RPF
Genre: Homophobia, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Mental Illness, Multi, Recreational Drug Use, Smut, Strained parental relationships, florist Katya, lesbian!au, musician Trixie, waitress trixie
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-28
Updated: 2018-06-15
Packaged: 2019-02-07 22:56:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 32,041
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12851292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katyazeroni/pseuds/katyazeroni
Summary: “I need flowers for my roommate. Something that says, ‘I’m sorry your cat is dead… But not that sorry. He always pissed on my bed and you shouldn’t have loved him more than me.’ Do you have something that says that?”Katya is a florist. Trixie is a waitress. They fall in love in a flower shop.





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> come say hi on tumblr! [@katyazeroni](https://katyazeroni.tumblr.com/)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> come say hi on tumblr! [@katyazeroni](https://katyazeroni.tumblr.com/)

Katya’s alarm goes off at 7:00, pulls her from the dark dredges of another restless sleep and into the day. It’s the same as always. Katya is only 23, but  _God_ , sometimes it feels like she’s been alive for sixty years. She graduated from a small school in Boston nearly two years ago with a completely useless degree in photography; something she’d lost her passion for not even halfway through her final year but followed through with anyway, mostly because the guilt of wasting her parent’s money was too much. Immediately following graduation, she packed up and moved to Williamsburg with her girlfriend after she’d landed her dream internship. Katya was over the moon happy for her, she didn’t even care that she had no job lined up in the city because she knew, she just  _knew_  they would be together forever and there was so much time to figure everything out. Forever turned out to be two months. Just long enough for Katya to sign a year long lease on an apartment she couldn’t afford alone and for her girlfriend to find someone new.

Katya had never felt heartbreak like that in her life. She’d never been broken up with, she was always the one that did the breaking up, and  _oh_ , she finally understood why there wasn’t an amicable split in her past. It was the kind of pain that consumed every part of your soul until you couldn’t breathe, couldn’t do anything without it seeping through and consuming you completely. She allowed herself one month to wallow in the pain; hiding in bed for days, not eating and chain smoking until she fell back into a fitful sleep, and when the first of the month rolled around she called her parents for a loan that she promised she would pay back as soon as she had a job. She stuck to her word, paid them back and then some with her first paycheck from the small flower shop near the bridge that she’d managed to get a job at. It wasn’t a terrible place to work, not by a long shot. The owner, Jinkx, was a bizarre woman that Katya absolutely adored.

There’s already light slipping in beneath the blinds that cover the window on the wall opposite her bed, and with a stretch and a groan, Katya is out of bed, pulling off her pajamas on the way to her small bathroom. She pees then cranks the knob in the shower as far to the left as it will go, knows the water probably won’t get much hotter than it already is but waits anyway before hopping under the spray. Her shower doesn’t last long, only long enough to wash away the remnants of sleep fogging her head and to shave her legs. She emerges slightly more awake than she was before, with a small cut on her knee from sloppily handling her razor. She wraps her wet hair up in a towel, wets her thumb in her mouth and presses it hard against the new wound, swearing under her breath at the sharp sting. She returns to her bedroom, slips into the bra she wore yesterday (and the day before that) and reaches into a laundry basket for the first pair of panties she can find.

The floor is cold on Katya’s feet, even in the middle of June, as she makes her way into the kitchen to put the kettle on the stove and have something for breakfast. She pulls an orange from the bowl of fruit sitting beside the kitchen sink and peels it while the water comes to a boil. Once her tea has been made and the orange eaten, she makes her way into the living room. She sets her mug on the window ledge beside an ashtray holding a half smoked joint with red lipstick painting the edge and unlocks the window, pushing it hard because the damn thing  _always_ sticks, until it opens outward. She climbs onto the fire escape, perches on the small cushion she keeps out there, unconcerned at the prospect of her neighbors seeing her in a bra and panties. It’s nothing they wouldn’t have seen before, and it’s nothing she’s ashamed of. The view isn’t anything spectacular, nearly all of Manhattan is blocked by the buildings and trees across the street, but it’s better than the yellowing white paint and brick inside the apartment. She moves the ashtray closer, lights up the joint and inhales; feels the heavy smoke resting in her lungs and pouring into her veins, making her limbs feel as though they weigh two tons but are somehow weightless at the same time. She lets herself float for a while, sipping her tea and smoking until the joint is down to the roach, thinking of nothing in particular while she watches people on the quiet street below hustling to work.

Jumping back through the window, Katya squints at the blue numbers glowing from the stove. 8:30. She returns to the bedroom, tugging the towel from her head and throwing it somewhere on the floor as she walks. She runs her fingers through her hair, detangling it as much as she can without using a brush and leaving it to air dry the rest of the way. From her closet she grabs a flowy black dress; one with bell sleeves and embroidered flowers that always makes her feel like some kind of school girl living in Moscow. She slips the dress over her head, twirls once in front of the mirrored closet door just to see the way the dress moves around her small frame when she stops spinning. She kneels down on the floor facing the mirror, grabs a kohl pencil from her cluttered makeup bag and rims her eyes the way she’s always done, smudging the dark black out with a small brush until it’s feathered gray beneath her eyes and over the lid. She adds a coat of mascara, and pauses for a moment before grabbing a tube of cherry red lipstick.

Carefully, Katya outlines her lips and fills them in, rubbing them together and puckering them in the mirror. She has always liked the way she looks with red lipstick on. Powerful and sexy; like she could rule the world instead of just a flower shop while her boss is in the country. It’s a layer of confidence she doesn’t have but wishes so badly she did. She puts on a pair of jelly platforms, red ones that match her lips and the flowers on her dress almost perfectly. Glancing down, she wiggles her toes and mentally curses herself for not painting them. Maybe there will be time tonight. She slips her purse across her body, double checks that she has her phone and keys, and starts the 20 minute walk to work.

By 10:00, the shop is open and Katya’s crouched down behind the counter, reaching for a bunch of ribbons and sheets of paper she’d cut the night before when the small wind chimes with little birds hanging from the hinge of the door jingle quietly. She hears the clack of heels on the brick floor of the shop and pokes her head up. There’s a woman standing just inside the door wearing a vintage looking sundress that hugs all her curves, stretches tight over her breasts and flows out towards the bottom but doesn’t hide the perfect hourglass shape of her waist into her thighs. She’s wearing a matching yellow bow tied up in her long, wavy blonde hair, and her lips are lips painted the brightest shade of pink Katya’s ever seen. She’s absolutely beautiful. The woman has an eyebrow raised and her lips curved into a smirk as she watches Katya blatantly check her out. A breath catches in Katya’s chest, “um, hi,” Katya clears her throat when her voice is barely more than a whisper and stands, brushes away the creases in her dress and grips the edge of the counter tight, “good morning. Can I help you find anything?”

A real smile spreads across the woman’s face and Katya can’t look away, couldn’t even if she tried. “I need flowers for my roommate. Something that says, ‘I’m sorry your cat is dead… But not that sorry. He always pissed on my bed and you shouldn’t have loved him more than me.’ Do you have something that says that?” Something about the woman’s slight accent, something Midwestern, maybe, and her deadpan delivery elicits a sharp laugh from Katya and she quickly clamps her jaw shut, sucking in a breath to compose herself. She nods twice, hair falling around her face, and steps out from behind the counter and toward the rows of flowers lining the back wall. Behind her, the other woman laughs too, and it’s the most wonderful sound Katya has ever heard.

“Traditionally white lilies are used in sympathy bouquets,” Katya’s hands shake slightly as she reaches for the prettiest lilies in the bucket, picking only the ones with no discolored petals or imperfections, “I like to add baby’s breath and a little color. Light pink roses, maybe.” She gathers the flowers into a small bouquet and turns to face the woman again, taking a few steps toward her. “How does this look?” Up close, Katya can see the smattering of freckles over the center of the woman’s face, the deep brown of her eyes. She can smell her perfume. Vanilla and jasmine. Subtle but distinct. It makes Katya’s heart race, and she briefly wonders if the other woman can tell.

The woman nods and smiles a little wider than before, “I love it, they’re beautiful.” Katya feels herself flush and gives the woman a smile in return, quickly moving back behind the counter. She wraps the flowers in a sheet of white parchment and carefully ties a silver ribbon into a bow around the stems, acutely aware of every movement she makes, knowing the woman is most likely watching her. “Do you own this place?” Katya shifts her eyes from the flowers to the woman at the sound of her voice and shakes her head, her hair coming out from where it was messily tucked behind her ear.

“I don’t, but I might as well with how often I’m here,” Katya laughs nervously, straightens the ribbon on the flowers, “Jinkx is on vacation with her wife. She’s the owner. Fucking crazy, but I love her to death.“ The woman chuckles and Katya feels a small rush of pride, wishes she could hear the sound on a loop forever, especially if she’s the one who made her laugh. She wants to ask if the woman has a wife, if she even likes girls at all, what she does for a living. But the words get caught in her throat and all Katya can do is smile down at the counter. The woman continues speaking when Katya doesn’t, says, "I’m Trixie,” and extends a hand like they’re at a job interview. It’s such a feminine name, and Katya wants to tell her it suits her; that she’s like a living doll from the 60s with her perfectly matched clothes and beautiful makeup.

“Katya,” she shakes Trixie’s hand and tries not to think about the softness of her palm against Katya’s or the way her thumb rubs over Katya’s knuckles. She releases Trixie’s hand and presses down hard on the buttons of the old fashioned cash register Jinkx was so excited to get even though Katya felt it was a downgrade from the old system. She charges $10 less than she should have just because she can. She decides she’ll pay it back out of pocket if anyone notices. “It’s $28 even,” Katya glances back up at Trixie and pushes her hair back behind her shoulder, willing it to stay put this time.

Trixie reaches into her bag and pulls out an atrociously pink wallet that Katya secretly loves and has her grinning, even though pink has never been her color. She silently takes the bills she is offered and exchanges them for the two she owes back. Trixie just smiles and puts them in the tip jar beside the register that reads, “just the tip, see how it feels,” in Katya’s handwriting and she winks, leaving Katya flustered again. Katya murmurs a thank you as Trixie scoops up the flowers from the counter and turns to leave. She pauses with her hand on the door, turns and calls out, “I’ll see you around, Katya.” And God, she loves the way her name sounds coming from between those lips. She wants to respond, say  _anything_ , but she keeps quiet, giving a small wave instead that Trixie never sees. She rests her forehead down on the counter once the door has closed and Trixie’s figure is out of view. Her heart is pounding in her ears and she laughs aloud to herself at the ridiculous thought of having a crush on a woman she’s just met. But Trixie is different, Katya can tell.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: Trixie's dead cat comment is inspired by a line from the movie "Imagine Me & You"


	2. Chapter Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> come say hi on tumblr! [@katyazeroni](https://katyazeroni.tumblr.com/)

It’s exactly eight days until Trixie returns to Beet & Yarrow. Katya spent all of them but one watching the door, waiting to catch a glimpse of the golden hair and deep brown eyes she found herself missing pathetically the minute Trixie left the shop. Even on Sunday during an early yoga class then brunch with Jinkx, her mind was occupied by thoughts of perfect pink lips and a body that she’d love to worship for days. Katya was smitten, and she didn’t even know Trixie. Not really, anyway.

Katya is standing near the window, tending to the cacti when she spots her waiting at the crosswalk. She’s just as tall and beautiful as Katya remembers, maybe even more so. Her hair is pulled back into another bow, a blue one that matches the popsicle print of her white a-line dress. It looks pretty against her tanned skin. Katya wonders if she has any hidden tan lines; what it would be like to run her tongue along them if she has any at all. She bites hard on the inside of her cheek, tries to stave off the freight train of obscene thoughts barreling toward her. She watches Trixie cross the street, one deliberate step after another in her platform heels, headed straight toward the shop. Katya catches a ghost of a smile on Trixie’s face and returns it, even though she isn’t completely positive Trixie can see her at all. She grabs a cactus that’s gone brown and mushy, _it has root rot_ , she thinks, and takes it to the counter.

Katya glances up toward the door and spots Trixie just on the other side, talking animatedly on her phone. She laughs loudly, head thrown back with one hand pressed to her chest and Katya feels her heart surge. She wishes she could hear it. She watches Trixie hang up and quickly adverts her eyes, looks down to adjust the way her shirt is tucked into her shorts. It’s one of her favorites; a red silk button down that’s longer in the back and patterned with eyes. She likes the way it looks with her cutoffs and Dr. Martens. She hopes Trixie likes it too. She’s taken extra care in getting ready for the past week, setting her alarm 30 minutes earlier to allow time to tame her hair and apply her makeup just right. She knows it’s ridiculous, that the chances anything will become of them are slim, but she can’t help it. She’s starting to enjoy the reckless optimism in hoping for it.

Trixie opens the door with a smile, eyes immediately finding Katya’s. She feels butterflies swarming in her stomach and up her throat as she returns Trixie’s smile. “Katya! I was hoping you’d be working today,” her voice is lilting, has that subtle Midwestern drawl Katya has heard every night in her dreams since they met. It’s soft, soothing, and Katya wants to know what it sounds like when she’s telling Katya about her day or when Katya’s buried between her thighs spelling words with her tongue. She feels her face flush with heat at the thought, even though it’s one she’s had many times in the last eight days. She cocks her head, responds with, “Anything specific I can help you find?”

Trixie falters; almost as though she hadn’t thought that far, and Katya notices almost immediately. She watches Trixie’s bright eyes sweep around the room, hunting for a something,  _anything_ to say. Katya feels another small flash of hope that maybe Trixie feels the same way as she does: Completely taken by a perfect stranger. “We got some new cacti in a few days ago. There’s one that reminded me of you,” she smiles hopefully up at Trixie, and when she’s met with a relived sigh, Katya knows she said the right thing. She steps out from behind the counter and gestures for Trixie to follow her toward the window. Crouching down, she reaches for a small pot in the very back, one that she absolutely did  _not_ hide so no one would be able to purchase it before she could show Trixie. The cactus is shaped like a small globe with spines that look soft enough to touch. Growing around the top is a halo of small hot pink flowers, almost like a crown. She stands, turning back toward Trixie with the plant in her right hand, “It’s a Mammillaria, but they’re usually called Powder Puffs.” She doesn’t tell Trixie that the Latin name means “nipple.” Katya looks up at Trixie with wide, hopeful eyes. She doesn’t know what she’s expecting, or even what her own gesture means.  

Trixie is grinning down at the plant and lets out a laugh that’s more of a yell than anything else, “Oh my  _God_ , I love it! The flower crown,” she pauses and lifts a hand, traces the air around the ring of flowers, careful not to touch any of the spines and continues with a nasally voice, “Amanda’s like, so ready for Coachella this year.” It takes Katya a moment to follow the thought, and then she’s laughing too, hard and uninhibited, the sound pulling Jinkx from the back room to see if everything is okay. Tears in her eyes, Katya assures her that they are fine, and sees Jinkx mouth,  _“is this the girl?”_  over Trixie’s shoulder. She just smiles. Trixie buys the Puff.  

* * *

The next time they see each other is three days later. It’s just after opening on a Monday morning, so the shop is completely dead. Katya is behind the counter with Adore, a college student that works part-time that Katya has grown to be rather fond of. Sometimes they’ll smoke weed in the back room when they can get away with it. It’s much better than doing it alone. Katya is teaching Adore how to make corsages when Trixie steps through the door. Her lips are curved into a slight pout but Katya still thinks she looks ridiculously beautiful. The way her dress flows around her body as she moves is like something out of a film. She comes to a stop in front of the counter, sets down the Mammillaria she’d bought just days earlier, and plants her hands on the cool metal. “Amanda is dead.”

Katya’s brow furrows at the same time Adore whispers, “what?” Katya glances down at the plant then back up at Trixie, “The cactus?”

Trixie leans her head back, sighs hard and over exaggerated, breaths out, “Yes,  _Katya_. The cactus. I killed it. It’s turning yellow.” She’s obviously upset, and Katya tries not to smile, but she fails miserably. Trixie is just so cute.

“I don’t think you can kill a cactus in three days,” Katya laughs, leans over to inspect it without getting a spine in her finger, “it looks like you’ve overwatered it. Adore, can you go get a small pot from the back? Something pink or white if we have it?” She doesn’t turn to the younger girl as she speaks, keeping her eyes locked on Trixie instead and catching a ghost of a smile cross her face. She hears Adore mumble, “yeah, whatever,” and shakes her head to herself.

“It needs to be repotted. The soil is too damp,” Katya grabs two pairs of gardening gloves from beneath the counter and passes one to Trixie. She hesitates for a moment before taking them, carefully slipping them on over her long, painted fingernails. Katya thought she saw a shimmer of rose gold glitter across them before they were hidden completely beneath the gloves. It’s a stark contrast from Katya’s own nails; cut short and painted black so any dirt that finds its way beneath her nails during work isn’t visible. Adore returns with a small pastel pink pot, handing it to Katya before plopping back down on the tall wooden stool that’s kept near the register.

Together, Katya and Trixie get Amanda safely moved into her new pink home (Trixie says it suits her better than the old one, anyway) and covered by fresh soil that Katya knows she rambles on about for just a few minutes too long when she sees Adore rolling her eyes at her. She gives Trixie precise instructions on caring for her cactus, and then she’s gone, smiling over her shoulder when she passes through the doorway. Katya feels like her heart is going to burst out of her chest. Before the door has closed behind Trixie, Adore lets out a cackle, asks, “What the  _hell_ was that?” and Katya knows Trixie could have heard her so she just shrugs while Adore continues, “Girl, you’ve got it bad.”

* * *

The third time they meet isn’t at Beet & Yarrow. It’s at the coffee shop one block away from the store that Katya has frequented since she was hired by Jinkx. The baristas there are complete assholes, but that doesn’t matter to Katya because they know how to make a damn good latte. She’s waiting at the counter for her drink, tearing off pieces of a bagel and popping them into her mouth when Trixie comes in. She’s accompanied by another woman, their arms are hooked together as they giggle and whisper about something. Katya’s heart sinks. She watches them order and feels like a complete creep, but she doesn’t have the guts to approach Trixie. Not now, when she’s with another woman.

The barista calls Katya’s name loudly from right beside her and she watches as Trixie’s head snaps up and her eyes find Katya’s. She smiles and waves, and starts making her way toward Katya, pulling the other woman along with her. Katya takes a sip of her latte, it isn’t too hot and it doesn’t clear the lump that’s lodged itself in her throat. “Hey! What are you doing here?” Trixie’s voice is sweet as ever and Katya smiles despite her discomfort.

“Lunch break,” she says, holding up the coffee and paper sack holding her bagel. Her eyes go from Trixie to the blonde beside her that looks incredibly bored with everything around them. Her arm is still looped through Trixie’s, but she’s scrolling through her phone. Trixie nods at Katya’s answer and follows her line of sight.

“Oh! Katya, this is Pearl, my roommate. Pearl, this is Katya, she’s the florist I told you about.” Pearl looks Katya up and down with an eyebrow raised and gives her a small smirk. Katya doesn’t have a hand to reach out and shake Pearl’s, so she settles for saying, “it’s nice to meet you. I’m sorry about your cat.” The words feel weird leaving her mouth and she instantly regrets them, but she doesn’t know what else she should say. Pearl gives her a look she can’t exactly decipher and doesn’t respond. Katya catches a glimpse of the clock on the wall behind Trixie and Pearl, says, “I need to get back to the shop. Jinkx doesn’t like Adore being there alone for too long.” She smiles, eyes lingering on Trixie for a moment as they say goodbye, and walks toward the door.

Behind her, she hears Pearl say, “She’s much hotter than you said, Trix,” followed by a shrill,  _“Pearl!”_  from Trixie, and a quieter, “I wish you were a dead fucking corpse in a fucking ditch, you know that?” Katya feels her face flush.  _Trixie thinks she’s hot._  The lump in her throat clears and she swings the door open, welcomes the heat that rushes over her as soon as she’s outdoors simply because it’s not the inside of that coffee shop. She takes another drink of her latte and wishes she had ordered something iced. 


	3. Chapter Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> come say hi on tumblr! [@katyazeroni](https://katyazeroni.tumblr.com/)

Katya decides five days after their meeting in the coffee shop that she's going to ask Trixie out the next time she sees her. It isn't a decision she makes lightly. Dating isn't a thing Katya does anymore. Ever since the breakup that left her in a nearly catatonic state, she prefers meaningless hookups to anything emotional. She goes to bars, picks up women and goes home with them (never to Katya's apartment; that's too personal), leaving immediately after they both get what they want. It would be easy to ask that of Trixie, to say, "I'm incredibly attracted to you and I'd like to fuck you," and see where it goes from there, but Katya knows Trixie is too good for that. She deserves more than a quick fuck. Katya wants to give Trixie everything under the Sun. The realization is absolutely terrifying.

It's July 4th and she's sitting out on her fire escape, a joint hanging from between her fingers as she watches fireworks exploding in the dark sky over Manhattan. She takes a drag, holds the heavy smoke in her lungs for a moment before exhaling. She wonders what Trixie is doing; if she's at a party or alone like Katya. Maybe next year they can be alone together. It's just after 10pm and the air is hot, sticky with humidity. Katya can feel everywhere her clothes are touching her body; it's like she's suffocating. She stubs the joint out in the ashtray and hops back into her apartment through the window, not bothering to close it behind her. She wanders into the bathroom and strips off her clothes, starts the water in the shower and climbs into the tub before it's warm. The icy water makes goosebumps erupt everywhere it touches. She stands face first beneath the shower head, feels her nipples grow hard under the spray, and lets the water run over her as it warms. She still feels like she's suffocating. Drowning. It's peaceful.

Katya turns her back to the water, washes her hair and face with quick efficiency before pulling the hand held shower head from its mount on the wall. She turns the dial until the spray is coming out hard enough to make her skin ripple where it's pounding against her thigh. Carefully lifting her foot into the corner of the tub, the spreads her legs, uses her right hand to part the lips of her cunt and angles the spray directly over her clit. She clenches hard around nothing; the spray is just on the painful side of too much and that's exactly how she likes it. Her head lolls back until she's pressed against the cold tile of the shower and her eyes slip shut. She imagines a girl on her knees between her legs, two fingers inside her while a skilled mouth works over her clit, imagines her hand grasping blonde hair close to the root while she rides the girl's face. The girl pulls back with a sly smile and it's Trixie, her chin and mouth dripping with spit and Katya's wetness, looking so fucking hot Katya could cry. She moans loud from deep in her belly and it echoes off the walls in her bathroom. Her orgasm crashes into her quicker than she would've liked, but it's so fucking good she has to sit down in the tub for a moment while the white stars clear from the corners of her eyes. 

* * *

The following morning, Katya feels antsy and gives herself an impulsive haircut ten minutes before she needs to leave for work. She pulls together a triangle section of hair over her forehead, twists it twice, and makes a blunt cut across them. She cuts the rest of her soft waves up to her shoulders, does her best to make it even without any clue as to what she's doing. _Maybe Adore will help me fix it later_ , she thinks. She removes the towel wrapped around her bare shoulders and shakes her head. She smiles at her reflection. Her head feels lighter and she looks younger. It's better than she expected it to be. She hurries to her bedroom and puts on a black lace maxi dress that's a little too tight, but in a kind of sexy way, pulls on a pair of combat boots, and rushes out the door. She's only fifteen minutes late to work and Adore laughs as soon as she sees Katya's new hair, asks, "Did you cut it while you were tripping on acid?" and fixes it in the back room with a pair of old scissors.

They're sitting on an old couch in the back during lunch, Katya with her legs pulled to her chest and Adore spread out over the other two cushions with her bare toes shoved under Katya's ass. They're passing a green glass pipe between them when she brings it up. "You know the girl who came in with the overwatered cactus? Trixie?" Adore exhales a large cloud of smoke and hums. "I'm going to ask her out." Adore just hums again and passes the pipe to Katya. She hits it while it's still cherried. "I'm nervous," she says on an exhale, "I don't do this." She sets the pipe down on Adore's outstretched palm.

"Just fucking tell her you want to bone. Don't make it a big deal," her voice is hoarse from the smoke, slow like she's talking to a child. She corners the lighter over the bowl and takes another hit while Katya watches.

"I don't want to, though. Well - I mean, I _do_ , I really fucking do, but I want more than that. You know?" Katya shakes her head when the pipe is offered to her once more, reaches instead for her latte that's gone cold just so she has something to do with her hands. "I haven't felt this way in a long time." She takes a long drink from the paper cup and sets it back on the side table. Adore doesn't respond and Katya's okay with that.

A comfortable silence settles over them until they hear the chimes hanging on the front door of the shop jingle softly through the curtain separating the shop from the back room. Katya sighs, leans her head back onto the couch and wills the feeling to come back to her arms and legs so she can move. She reaches down into her bag that's on the floor at her feet and pops two mints into her mouth, crunches on them while she sprays a bit of orange scented perfume in the air around her. It’s better if the customers can't smell the weed on her. She's pushing herself up when a voice calls out, "Is anyone here?" and she _knows_ that voice. Trixie. "Oh, fuck, fuck, fuck, _fuck_ ," Katya is whispering under her breath and Adore laughs beside her as she pulls on her boots. Trixie is here, _now,_ and Katya is stoned. So, _so_ stoned. She stands, nearly losing her balance when her ankle gets twisted in the strap of her bag but Adore is there to grab her arm and keep her upright. She laughs again, this time with her head thrown back, says, "I need to go finish the deliveries," and winks, leaving the shop through the back door. Katya pushes her dress back down her legs and takes a deep breath. She moves the curtain to the side, smiling at Trixie when she spots her.

Trixie is as beautiful as ever, hair tied half up in a bun that rests on the crown of her head with a pink flower fastened to the side and a turquoise dress that hits just above her knee with a scalloped hem. Katya wonders how many dresses Trixie owns, if she has anything _but_ dresses in her closet. Katya hopes she doesn't; they look perfect on her. "Hey," she moves closer, steps around the counter this time so there's nothing separating them, "how's it going?" She's aiming for cool and collected, but it comes out a little forced. Trixie doesn't seem to care though, because she's smiling at Katya, and _wow_ , if feels like her insides have melted into a puddle of mush.

"Your hair!" Trixie reaches forward with an excited grin on her face, runs her fingertips gently through the part that's framing Katya's face and she feels her heart stop for a second, has to remind herself to breathe, "I love it." Trixie's voice is softer than Katya's ever heard it, and she feels herself leaning into Trixie's hand before she's pulling it away. Trixie clears her throat. "I was in the neighborhood," she doesn't break eye contact with Katya, continues, "thought I'd come bother you for a little while until I need to be at work." Katya feels her face flush and ducks her head. She hopes that means Trixie thinks about her as much as she thinks of Trixie. "I mean, if that's okay. I don't want you getting in trouble."

Katya looks back up, places a hand on Trixie's arm, "It's more than okay. It's usually pretty slow here in the afternoon." She takes her hand back, nervously adjusts her new bangs, "Jinkx isn't here anyway, and Adore is on deliveries. Or smoking in the alley. I never really know." She smiles and rounds the counter, grabs the wooden stool that's always there and sets it down closer to Trixie, gesturing for her to sit. She does, says, "how chivalrous of you," and Katya thinks the way she crosses her legs at the ankle and lets her feet hang is too adorable. "So, you work nearby?" Katya tries to keep it casual and doesn't think about asking Trixie out yet. There's time to work up to that.

Trixie nods, "I do, I'm a waitress at Rabbithole." Katya's heard of it; a small hipster joint the girls in her yoga class frequent for brunch. She had been invited a few times, but never went, so she just nods. The thought that she could've met Trixie sooner if she had accepted the invitation lingers in the back of her mind. "It's okay. I get good tips," she laughs and Katya can't help but smile down at the pile of orders she's sorting through, "but I don't want to be working there forever."

Katya looks up at that, cocks her head and asks, "what do you want to do forever?" She worries for a moment that's too deep of a question, that Trixie won't want to answer something so private. Forever is a long time to be asking someone about when you barely know them. But it's the kind of existential shit Katya loves talking about when she's high. She likes to question everything from the origin of the universe to the reason her toaster can't seem to toast the left side of her bread as much as it does the right. The toaster thing isn't much of a mystery, but sometimes she wishes it was. "I want to be a musician," Trixie's voice has gone soft again, "Country music, and don't you dare laugh at me. I'm fucking good."

Katya nods, says, "I would never laugh at someone's dream," and goes back to looking through orders. She finds one that's not too complicated; a small birthday bouquet with sunflowers, yellow roses, and yellow carnations. Happy, sunny, yellow everything. She pulls a vase, jade green and tall, from beneath the counter and goes to gather the flowers on the other side of the shop. "Though, I do think it's a slightly questionable choice, but that's none of my business," she glances over her shoulder at Trixie and gives her a grin so she knows Katya's only kidding. She pulls the flowers and a few sprigs of baby's breath for a little contrast. She turns back around in time to see Trixie rolling her eyes and _God,_ if Katya doesn't want to kiss her. She lays the flowers out on the counter, grabs a pair of shears and starts trimming the stems. "I'd love to hear you sometime," and she means it, too. Country music isn't her style, but maybe if Trixie played it, it would be.

Trixie is looking at her with a glint in her eye that Katya can't exactly read, and she refocuses her attention on arranging the flowers neatly in the vase. She hears Trixie slide off the stool, walk toward her and stop at the counter beside Katya. Their sides brush when Trixie reaches for a sunflower. It's the biggest one on the counter, and she twirls it between her fingers before placing it in the vase. "Is that okay?" Trixie's voice is a whisper beside Katya's ear and she feels goosebumps appear on the back of her neck. She nods and reaches for two more flowers, handing one to Trixie wordlessly. They arrange the flowers together and it takes twice as long as it normally would because they both keep moving the flowers the other had put in the vase. When they're done, Katya pulls a blue ribbon from a stack and ties it into a floppy bow around the vase. "If being a musician doesn't work out for you, maybe you could be a florist," Katya smiles when Trixie laughs and grabs a card, starts writing the birthday message in cursive: _To Caroline, may your 50th birthday be filled with love. Here's to 50 more, XO Jerry._ She wonders if someone will send her flowers on her 50th birthday, if it will be someone she's been in love with for 25 years. The thought makes her giddy and sad at the same time.

She moves the vase onto a shelf with other completed bouquets that need to be delivered tomorrow, turns, and Trixie is leaning on the counter, watching Katya with wide eyes and a content smile and she knows. She knows she has to ask her now or she'll lose her nerve. "Do you want to go out sometime? Maybe this Saturday?" She feels her palms start to sweat and she rubs them over her thighs, "On a date, I mean. It would be a date. With me." She knows she's starting to babble but she's so damn nervous. Trixie could say no, tell Katya she's straight and Katya had misread the situation entirely, but Trixie giggles and nods, replies with a hushed, "I would like that very much." Katya's heart leaps into her throat and she's moving closer to the counter, propping herself up on her elbows and starting excitedly, "I was thinking we could go to Smorgasburg and wander around. Eat lots of food." Trixie is still grinning down at her and Katya wants to kiss her so bad her heart is starting to hurt.

"I have no idea what that is, but yeah, okay," Trixie pulls her phone out of a pocket in her dress and passes it to Katya, "I have to get going, but put your number in and I'll text you for details, okay?" Katya nods, tries hard not to comment on the pink case, because _of course_ it's pink, and enters her name with three flower emojis beside it so Trixie knows it's her. She hands the phone back to Trixie, feels another flutter in her chest when their hands brush. "I'll see you Saturday, Katya," Trixie leans forward over the counter and kisses Katya on the cheek. She freezes, doesn't trust her voice enough to say goodbye as Trixie leaves the shop so she just waves. She knows there has to be a pink lipstick stain on her cheek but she doesn't care at all. She wants to wear it all day, proudly, like a badge of honor, telling everyone that she has a real date on Saturday for the first time in almost two years with a girl she knows is absolutely perfect. 


	4. Chapter Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> come say hi on tumblr! [@katyazeroni](https://katyazeroni.tumblr.com/)

It's Thursday morning, just before 8:00, and Katya is standing in the kitchen, bent easily into Uttanasana pose. She feels a sharp pull in her hamstrings when she lifts her toes and promises herself that she'll make the time for yoga more than once this week. Her phone vibrates on the counter beside her, makes her sigh and pull herself back upright. The only person that ever texts her this early is Jinkx when she's telling Katya she'll be in to work late (or sometimes not at all). The text is a picture from an unknown number. It's a Mammillaria that Katya recognizes instantly sitting on a window sill, early morning light pouring in from behind and casting everything in a golden yellow glow. The pastel pink pot has been decorated in a variety of stickers that make it look like something that would belong in a child's room. Katya kind of loves it. The attached text reads: _Amanda is thriving in her new Barbie Dreamhouse._ A smile spreads across Katya's face and her thumbs are hovering over the keyboard when another message comes through. _This is Trixie, by the way._

 _I figured._ Katya licks her bottom lip and pulls it between her teeth. _I'm glad Amanda is adjusting well to the move. And I love the stickers._ She hesitates for a moment before adding a winking emoji, then presses send before she can talk herself out of it. The kettle on the stove starts to whistle and Katya pours the boiling water over the teabag in her bright blue mug. It's one of her favorites even though there's a chip in the handle that sometimes scrapes her knuckles if she doesn't pay attention to how she's holding it. She takes her phone and tea out onto the fire escape, settles on her cushion, and lights up a joint with a flick of a red lighter. Her phone buzzes twice from where it's squeezed between her thighs. _Is it too much?_ Trixie uses an obscene amount of emojis in her texts, this one has four, and for some reason Katya finds that completely endearing in a way she doesn't with anyone else. She takes a long drag from her blunt, leaves it resting between her lips as she types, _not at all. It's adorable._

They text throughout the morning; Trixie calling Katya a fucking stoner when she learns of Katya's morning ritual of tea and weed and in a moment of bravery, Katya sends a picture of herself taken in the mirrored closet door, says, _Mama, do I look like a stoner to you?_ She's wearing a pair of jean shorts that make her legs look much longer than they really are with an off the shoulder crop top covered in printed birds and a pair of black TOMS. _You look beautiful_ is Trixie's reply, and Katya's heart throbs in her chest alongside butterflies for the entire walk to the shop. Trixie usually texts back quickly, and if Katya doesn't respond within a few minutes, she'll send a second or third text. Katya loves that too. It's like Trixie _wants_ to talk to Katya. Finds her interesting. A light feeling settles in Katya's chest, one that she wishes would stay there forever. For the first time in two years working at the shop, Katya's phone is tucked into her back pocket instead of inside her bag in the back room. She doesn't want to risk missing a text from Trixie. Around noon, the messages slow. Trixie is working. She sends a text about a man in the restaurant with a terribly obvious toupee that has Katya laughing so hard tears gather in the corners of her eyes, and an hour later Katya texts a picture of the biggest bouquet she's ever made, 100 red roses, which earns her an _absolutely stunning_ from Trixie. Katya sits on the couch in the back room during her lunch break and forgets to eat anything at all. Trixie is much more interesting than the salad that's sitting in the fridge.

 _Are you still at work?_ The text comes through just as Katya is walking up the stairs to her apartment. She struggles momentarily with the lock and pushes the door open, throwing her bag on the floor and slipping her shoes off. _Just got home, why?_ She makes her way to the bedroom, sets her phone on the bed and strips; peels off her clothes and replaces them with a worn old t-shirt she can't seem to get rid of, even though it's covered in holes and stains. The phone vibrates and when it doesn't stop, Katya glances down, sees that Trixie is calling her, and scrambles to pick it up before it goes to voicemail. "Trixie! Hi," she exhales hard, closes her eyes and presses her free hand to her forehead, "Hey. What's up?" Trixie laughs on the other end of the line, the sound tinny and far away but still so beautiful. It's quickly becoming one of Katya's favorite sounds.

"Hi, Katya," her voice sounds sweet, honey-thick when it wraps around Katya's name and she's smiling immediately. She can't be sure, but she thinks Trixie might be too. "So. Saturday. Where are you taking me, again?" She says it with a small laugh and Katya has no idea how she's going to make it through an entire date with Trixie if she's there looking perfect and speaking with that damn voice. Katya sits on the floor beside her bed, presses her back against the metal frame and stretches her legs out until the bottoms of her feet are touching the wall.

"It's called Smorgasburg. It's like a flea market but with food? Lots of food. And drinking! A few blocks from there, there's an _actual_ flea market with like, clothes and stuff? I think you’d really like it. Oh! And it's right along the river too, so we can go to the park and look out at the city if you want!" Katya's leg is bouncing against the floor, her heart is racing, and she knows she was talking way too fast. She presses her palm to her chest and takes a deep breath, tells herself _calm down, it's just a girl._

"That sounds wonderful," Trixie's voice dulls the edges of the exposed nerves in Katya's mind; it's almost musical when she speaks. There's a small bit of silence before Katya feels composed enough to speak again. "Can I pick you up? I mean, I would like to, if that's alright. Around 11, I was thinking? If we get there too late all the good stuff will be gone," she laughs nervously, hopes she doesn't sound too crazy. She wants to do everything right with Trixie; leave no room for error, and that means picking her up like a lady.

"Yeah, definitely. I'll text you my address if you promise you're not gonna come kill me in the middle of the night or anything," Katya can hear the grin in Trixie's voice, replies with a short, "I don't kill until after the third date," and greedily welcomes the brash laughter coming through the phone and the butterflies the sound puts in her stomach.

"I should get going to bed, I have an early morning tomorrow," Katya glances at the clock on her nightstand. _10:30_. She bobs her head even though Trixie can't see her. She doesn't want Trixie to hang up, she wants to stay awake until the sun rises, talking about everything under the sun just so she can hear that voice a little longer. "Have a good night, okay?"

"You too," Katya's voice is soft, reluctant. "Sleep well, Trixie."

* * *

Trixie texts Katya at 5:30, a full hour and a half before Katya wakes up, complaining about being awake before the sun and how it's just _criminal_. Katya waits until her mind is awake; until she's had her tea and smoked, to text Trixie back. _I hope you got to see the sunrise._ She's dressed in bright patterned leggings, a loose top, and is out the door, walking to her yoga class before Trixie responds. It's a picture, and though the sun isn't in it, the sky is pastel blue and the Manhattan skyline is painted brilliant shades of orange and pink, the colors of clouds reflecting in big windows. Katya can see two people sitting close together on a park bench near the river, and she briefly wonders what it would be like to sit there with Trixie, waiting for the sun come up and feeling the morning breeze come off the water. They'd sip on coffee, hers hot and Trixie's iced, arms wrapped around each other and trading kisses until the park was alive with tourists and families. Katya sighs, she's getting ahead of herself and she knows it, but she doesn't want to stop, can't bring herself to. She pulls open the door of the yoga studio and tries to push every thought of Trixie out of her mind. The class will be worthless if she doesn't.

Katya thinks about her through the entire class. She imagines Trixie in every pose, and then some; the curves of her body when she's twisted up or lying flat, the way her breasts would push outward in every chest opening pose. Katya's heart is pounding hard in her ears by the time class is over and her legs feel wobbly from the adrenaline pumping through her veins, but she decides to jog home anyway, yoga mat strapped to her back. She takes the long way, the _really_ long way, and runs around her neighborhood for an extra twenty minutes. She's so full of nervous energy and something else she doesn't really have a name for by the time she gets home that she can't even think. She leans her mat on the wall just inside the door and toes off her worn out tennis shoes. It's just before noon, and sunlight is streaming in from the windows, casting shadows off the plants hanging from the ceiling, sitting on shelves, and resting on the floor. Katya barely notices. She fills a mug with water in the kitchen, and drinks it all in one go. There's sweat drenching her shirt and, _fuck_ , it always grosses her out how much she can sweat. She pulls a face and takes it off, throws it on the counter. Her skin feels like fire. She wishes she could take it off too.

A shower and a small smoke session on the fire escape make Katya feel exponentially more human than before, and it's later in the afternoon, when she's waking up slow and languid from a nap, that she gets a text from Trixie. _I wish it was tomorrow already._ Katya types her reply with little thought.

 _What are you doing tonight?_  

Immediately after it's sent, a lump is in Katya's throat and she's asking herself what the hell she was thinking as she tosses her phone to the other end of the bed. She pulls herself out from under the covers and stands on the cool wood floor. She runs her hands through her hair and stares at the bed, waits for something to happen. There's vibrating coming from beneath a knitted quilt and her heart speeds up. She throws the blanket to the side, kneels up on the mattress and unlocks her phone. _I don't know. What am I doing tonight?_

Katya feels a grin bloom over her face, types, _having coffee with your favorite florist,_ and sends a separate text with, _I'll meet you at Black Brick around 6?_ She finds herself using far too many emojis just to match Trixie's texts. Trixie's reply is short; a simple _okay,_ but the sparkling heart tacked on the end makes Katya's own flutter in her chest. She wonders if it's possible for a crush to give you an actual heart attack. 

* * *

Katya spends over an hour getting ready. She kind of hates herself for it. In the past, she'd prided herself on being relatively low maintenance; on needing more time to smoke than it takes for her to shower and make herself presentable. She spends forty minutes on her hair alone, carefully wrapping sections around the barrel of a curling wand and straightening her bangs so they lay just right against her forehead. It looks effortless, and the irony of the time she spent to make it look that way is not lost on her. She brings her makeup bag into the bathroom where there's better light, carefully lines her eyes in black, smokes it out and stacks a pair of false lashes on top of her own. She paints on a matte red lip, one she knows won't rub off if Trixie happens to kiss her. Just in case. 

It takes twenty minutes to decide on an outfit, but the one she lands on makes her feel more comfortable in her own skin than anything else hanging in the closet. She looks at herself in the mirrored door, takes in the sheer black top with vertical stripes in contrasting patterns down the front that's tucked into a black mini skirt covered in embroidered flowers, and black clogs with wooden soles. She thinks she looks sexy, her legs fully on display and her skirt hugging her ass just right. She adds two beaded bracelets and three necklaces when she can't choose between them; a tight black choker, a silver bar with _Yekaterina_ engraved on it (it was a gift from her parents that she wears whenever she needs a little more luck, always backwards with the lettering facing her skin), and a long chain with a gold magnifying glass charm. She slips her purse over her shoulder and heads out the door, getting halfway down the stairs before turning back to double-check that she locked the door. She did.

When Katya rounds the corner and the coffee shop comes into view, and Trixie is already there. Katya takes a moment, slows her pace, and looks at Trixie. She's absolutely stunning; leaning back against the brick building, wearing a mint green dress, and Katya's even more convinced now that that's all she owns, and a pair of white cowboy boots that has Katya grinning before she can stop herself. Trixie spots her, and a smile as wide as Katya's spreads across her face. "Katya!" She takes a few steps and embraces Katya in a hug she wishes would never end. Katya can smell the vanilla and jasmine perfume Trixie had been wearing the day they met, and the smell is stronger behind her ears when Katya turns her head into the hug and says, “I hope you weren’t waiting long.” She doesn’t need to check the time, knows she is at least ten minutes early. 

Trixie pulls back, slides her hand into the crook of Katya’s elbow. People push past them on the sidewalk and it makes Katya anxious, gives her the urge to apologize and drag Trixie inside the coffee shop where they're safely out of the way, but Trixie is unwavering. She’s still smiling down at Katya when she shakes her head, "I got here just before you."

Katya nods, "that's good." Another man pushes around them, knocking Katya into Trixie, who throws the man a look Katya would not like to be on the other end of. "We should go inside." Trixie doesn't move her hand from Katya's arm, only nods and stays close to Katya as they walk through the shop to the counter. Normally, Katya would hate it, prefers to be the one initiating physical contact, but it's different with Trixie. They order their drinks from a woman with cropped blue hair, and Katya puts up a small fight when Trixie pulls out her wallet to pay but she just says, "You can pay tomorrow," and winks, leaving Katya flustered.

They settle into two wingback chairs in a back corner, Katya with her latte and Trixie with a complicated iced drink that Katya knows has to be incredibly sweet. She sits on her hip with her legs pulled up beneath her, and watches as Trixie crosses her ankles delicately and smoothes her dress over her knees. She stares at Katya with a sly smile that Katya feels down to her core. "So, I have to tell you before we get any further into this: I lied to you the day we met." Katya's eyebrows draw together; she knows somewhere deep inside that Trixie was too good to be true and it's all about to come crashing down as her heart rate speeds up. "Pearl, my roommate, she never had a cat," Trixie takes a sip of her drink, "I saw you through the window when I was on my way to work. I had to go in." She shrugs, doesn't look the slightest bit ashamed of her admission, "I needed to meet you."

Katya cackles, "Oh, that is so creepy." She knows there's a flush spreading across her face, but she doesn't bother dwelling on it because now she _knows_ Trixie was drawn to her too. Katya doesn't believe in destiny or soulmates, always thought they were silly ways for sad people to have hope, but there's something indescribably fated in meeting Trixie the way she did. "You could've just come in, you know," Katya's grinning wide, "said, _'hey, I'm interested in you,'_ or something like that." She knows it's a borderline hypocritical thing to say when she'd been told by Adore to do the same thing and refused, but she wants Trixie to know she _could've_ and it wouldn't have scared Katya away.

Trixie just shrugs, "I think it was more fun this way." She takes another long drink, teases the tip of her straw along her plump bottom lip and Katya can't seem to look away. "Besides, the flowers were stunning and they made my boss go easy on me when I was forty minutes late." Katya laughs, shaking her head. Trixie continues, "Pearl, however, called me a dumb bitch. So…" She trails off and shrugs again.

"You guys work together?" Katya twists one of her bracelets around her wrist but she never takes her eyes off of Trixie.

Trixie gives her a short nod, "We met through friends a few years ago and totally clicked. After we graduated, she got me a job at the restaurant because there was no way I was going back to Wisconsin. Then when my lease was up a few months ago, I moved in with her." Katya hums, takes a drink of her coffee. _Wisconsin_ , she thinks. That's the slight accent she couldn't place. She wonders why Trixie didn't want to move back home after graduation, if it's the same reason Katya's own relationship with her family is strained and why she hasn't talked to them in years. She decides it's too soon to ask. "Tell me about you," Trixie's eyes are intense, staring straight through Katya.

"Well, I uh, grew up in Boston. I'm an only child. I moved here after college a few years ago with my girlfriend and when we broke up, I just stayed," Katya looks down at the paper cup in her hand, traces around the hole in the lid with her thumb, "I'm not close with my parents, so I didn't see a reason to go back." She glances back up and Trixie is staring at her like she's waiting for Katya to say more. "They're religious," her eyes shift around the room to see if anyone's paying attention to them. No one is. "Last time we spoke, my mom said, ' _Yekaterina, we can send you somewhere for help. You don't have to be gay anymore.'_ " She smiles sadly at Trixie and in her eyes, she sees the same pain. It breaks her heart knowing Trixie has felt it too.

Trixie is silent for a moment before she gives Katya a soft smile, "Yekaterina is a very pretty name."

They stay at the coffee shop for several hours. She learns that Trixie graduated with a degree in Music Composition, which she says she isn't using, but Katya argued, saying if she's writing anything at all it can't be a waste. When the shop has closed, they linger just outside the entrance and finish their conversation. Trixie pulls Katya into a hug, says, "I had a really great time," soft beside Katya's ear. She releases Katya just enough that they can see each other's faces before she's leaning in again, pressing her lips against Katya's. Katya leans up into it, cups the side of Trixie's jaw with her right hand and feels sparks shooting down her spine. When they part, Trixie licks her lips and smiles shyly, "I'll see you tomorrow, Katya." They go opposite directions and Katya feels like she's falling the whole way home.

* * *

Katya takes her time again when getting ready on Saturday. She meticulously styles her hair and applies her makeup, takes time to pick an outfit that will be comfortable to walk around in. She puts on a pair of blue patterned harem pants and a tight white t-shirt. Glancing in the mirror, she feels like she looks too plain and slides on a bracelet made of clay, two rows of perfect white teeth painted on. She paints her toes bright pink, a color she normally wouldn't choose for herself, but it reminded her of Trixie and she couldn't resist buying it. She's kind of starting to love pink. As she's walking out the door, she slides on her Birkenstocks and a pair of sunglasses with scratched lenses she knows she should probably throw away but the shape is too perfect on her.

Trixie's apartment is too far away to walk, so she takes the subway. There's a man on the platform playing an acoustic guitar and singing in Spanish. A small crowd has gathered around him, mostly people with small children, and Katya gives him five dollars while she waits. The train is busy and Katya feels anxiety starting to bloom just under her skin at the close proximity of a man that's towering over her. She forces herself to take deep breaths, in through her nose and out through her mouth. The train comes to a halt, rocks the man into Katya's space. She's the first person back on the platform, taking stairs two at a time to get back above ground. Trixie is already outside when Katya gets to the apartment, dressed in a sheer white blouse with small buttons down the front tucked into a pink skirt that hits mid thigh. Her floppy hat covers half of her face, but Katya can see enough to know that Trixie's smiling. "Hey!" she calls out to Katya and they hug like they've known each other for years. Katya gives Trixie a small kiss on the cheek and grabs her hand, lacing their fingers together for the walk to the markets.

They spend the entire morning shopping; Trixie buys vintage jewelry, all silver and pink toned, and Katya purchases a set of mugs from the 70s with creepy faces carved into the sides that Trixie says remind her of her cousins. They buy more food than either of them could ever eat just so they can sample some of everything, and even though Katya knows she's going to have to live modestly for a while to make up for all the money she's spent, it's still worth it. She already knows she'd buy Trixie the world and give it to her wrapped up neat in a pink satin bow if it would make her happy. If it would make her smile at Katya one more time. She's falling hard and fast, but the danger of a broken heart is forced out of her mind when Trixie leans over the table and kisses her like it's the easiest thing in the world. They hold hands as they walk to Trixie's apartment from the park. It isn't far, only five blocks, and it's on the way to where Katya will catch the subway home.

Trixie lives in a newer building that's nothing like Katya's remodeled Pre-War apartment. Katya pauses outside the door to the lobby, but Trixie's pulling the door open, dragging Katya through the threshold with their joined hands, and saying, "c'mon." They ride in the elevator side by side to the fifth floor, and while Trixie tells her about the fire alarm incident that happened the week she moved in, all Katya can focus on is how _right_ Trixie's hand feels in hers. Trixie's boots thump dully on the tiled hallway to her door. She drops Katya's hand only when they stop in front of a dark grey door marked '53' on the wall beside it. She digs her keys out of her bag and Katya notices a Wisconsin license plate keychain hanging from one of the rings. Trixie pushes the door open, takes a step toward Katya and smiles.

"You can come inside. If you want," Trixie pauses, her eyes flick from Katya's down to her lips, "Pearl isn't home." She has a look in her eyes that Katya recognizes instantly. She lifts to her toes, presses her lips hard against Trixie's and rests her arms around Trixie's tapered waist. She walks Trixie back through the doorway and into the apartment, closes the heavy door behind them with the heel of her sandal and presses Trixie against the wall opposite the door. Trixie sets the brown bag holding their purchases on the floor while Katya takes off her hat, tosses it on the floor and ducks her head, sucks kisses down the column of Trixie's neck. She revels in the gasp a kiss pressed beneath Trixie's ear earns her. "Katya, Katya," Trixie's voice is hushed, "bed… My bedroom is back there." Her hand moves from where it was resting low on Katya's waist and waves to the left side of the apartment. Katya nods, murmurs, "okay," against the damp skin where Trixie's neck and shoulder meet. She sucks hard on the ridge of Trixie's collar bone, pulls the thin skin between her teeth and feels Trixie's knees buckle, her body sag further down the wall.

Katya pulls back and grins. With Trixie slumped against the wall, they're eye level now, and Katya goes in for another kiss, feels like magnets are pulling them together. Her hands reach behind Trixie's back, fumble slightly before tugging down the tiny zipper on her skirt, and she separates their lips only long enough to whisper, "this okay?" Trixie nods her head, grips Katya's shoulders and stares at her with wide eyes. Katya hooks her thumbs into Trixie's skirt and panties, tugs them down together, kneeling to help Trixie step out of them. She looks up her breath catches in her throat. Trixie is positively stunning; head thrown back against the wall, eyes shut. The way the light bends through the window and casts a rainbow across Trixie's face makes her look like an ethereal being. Katya thinks she really might be one. She grabs behind Trixie's right knee, murmurs, "lift your leg," and when Trixie does, she sets it over her shoulder, spreads Trixie wide open. She presses open mouthed kisses from Trixie's knee and up her thigh, hears one small whine before Trixie's hand twists in the back of Katya's hair and she's pressing Katya's face toward her cunt. All Katya can do is huff a laugh before her mouth is brushing against soft, overheated skin.

Trixie is lovely; the way her belly curves soft into her pubic mound, the creases where her thighs meet her hips, the way the inner lips of her pussy peek out just past smooth outer lips and shine with how wet she is. Katya flattens her tongue, drags it slow up Trixie's labia from her dripping entrance to her clit. Her hand tightens where it's twisted in Katya's hair, pulls Katya's face closer to her body, and Katya can't really breathe but _God_ , is this the way she would love to die. She laps gently around Trixie's clit, knows it isn't near enough to make Trixie come, but the moans coming from between Trixie's lips are wicked; tearing from the center of her chest and echoing in the hallway. She dips her tongue into Trixie's pussy, fucks her with it and is overwhelmed with the heat and taste. Trixie gasps above her, presses her hips down against Katya's face. "More," her voice is soft, "Katya, please." Katya moves her mouth back up and sucks hard on Trixie's clit while she slips two fingers into the wet heat of Trixie's cunt. She presses up and forward, draws another guttural moan from Trixie, "God, fuck, _fuck,_ yes… Just like that, baby." 

Katya pulls her head back, can feel how wet her chin is but she grins up at Trixie anyway, "Baby, huh?" Trixie laughs and it's cut short when Katya fucks her fingers hard into Trixie. She watches the way Trixie's chest hitches beneath her top and wishes for a moment Trixie had taken it off.

"Shut up and get me off," Trixie's voice is higher than Katya's ever heard it. She ducks her head back down, swirls her tongue in circles around the swollen nub of Trixie's clit. Her moans get louder and higher in pitch when Katya picks up the speed of both her fingers and tongue. Katya feels the tight clench of Trixie's pussy around her fingers, feels her body shake and hands grip tighter at Katya's hair when she comes. She licks Trixie through it, slow and steady circles until her moans morph into whines. She draws her fingers out, wipes her mouth and chin on the back of her hand. Trixie moves her leg off of Katya's shoulder and slips down the wall, her legs bracketing Katya where she's still kneeling on the floor. She has her eyes closed, her breathing is still labored, and Katya leans forward to kiss her, hands closing around Trixie's upper arms.

Trixie moans against Katya's lips when she tastes herself, one of her hands moves back into Katya's hair and she controls the kiss, sliding her tongue alongside Katya's behind her teeth. All Katya can do is let her; let Trixie take whatever it is she's trying to get from Katya. It's filthy and hot; two things Katya never expected out of the afternoon. Before Katya realizes it, Trixie is shoving her hand down the front of her pants, beneath her panties. Katya slides her knees further apart, feels Trixie's nails scratch through her pubic hair and she huffs out a laugh that Katya's almost positive means, _"of course you have a full bush,"_ before she reaches the shaved skin of her lips. Her fingers dip in between, inside, where Katya knows she's soaked, before moving up to her clit and rubbing her with a clear objective of making Katya come as quickly as possible. She comes with Trixie's tongue in her mouth, can't make any sounds other than a muffled groan into Trixie's mouth because she is still intent on _taking_ and Katya is more than happy to let her. Her tongue is replaced in Katya's mouth by two wet fingers she doesn't realize have stopped touching her because she's gagging with the force that Trixie shoves them in her mouth.

"You are so hot, Katya," Trixie's voice is rough and makes Katya wish Trixie's fingers were still on her, in her, would make her come again, "so beautiful." Katya wraps her tongue around the fingers, sucks hard when Trixie draws them out. Her eyes are hooded when she opens them to look at Trixie, when she sees the impish grin on her face and the flush on her cheeks. Katya leans forward, rests her forehead on Trixie's collarbone. She wants to say _you are too_ , wants to say something clever or sexy but all she can do is take one breath after another and wait for the feeling to come back to her legs. She feels Trixie's fingers scratch up and down her back, lets a feeling of calm wash over her as she comes down.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> PSA: this is fiction, and they didn't take the proper steps to having safe sex (i.e. washing hands, using protection, or discussing their status with STDS). please, _please_ practice safe sex!


	5. Chapter Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> come say hi on tumblr! [@katyazeroni](https://katyazeroni.tumblr.com/)

It was after two in the afternoon and the sun was still high, casting shadows of buildings over most of the street. Katya's shift at Beet & Yarrow had just ended and she was waiting for Trixie to pick her up. They had been on the phone most of the night before, discussing their plans for the following day. Trixie had excitedly called Katya two days after their trip to Smorgasburg, told her she impulsively bought tickets to a show; a musical Katya's never heard of, but Trixie didn't seem to mind. It's not really Katya's scene, not since she was small and her parents took her to a community theater production of Macbeth that had her covering her head with her coat whenever the witches came on stage, but she was going anyway. She couldn't say no, not with the excitement in Trixie's voice when she told Katya she knew the lead and that the show was heartbreaking in the best possible way. Katya could sit through two hours in a dark theater, especially if Trixie was beside her, holding her hand. She'd do anything if it meant Trixie would hold her hand.

Katya runs a finger over the waxy leaf of a houseplant sitting near the counter, grinning to herself when she spots Trixie across the street. She hurries to the back room, grabs the backpack she'd stuffed her makeup bag and outfit inside (along with a few other things, in case the night ran long and she stayed with Trixie, and she hoped she would) that morning. Trixie had helped her pick the outfit the night before, when their phone call turned into FaceTiming in front of their closets. They, meaning Trixie, decided on a dress that hits just below Katya's knees, shows off her calves and has a low neckline that accentuates her décolletage. Katya likes it because of the yellow pompoms hanging from the bottom hem and the sleeves, but she has a feeling Trixie barely noticed them, if the way her eyes were glued to Katya's chest said anything. When she gets back to the front of the store, Trixie is already inside, eyeing a shelf full of bonsai trees. Her hair is pulled up into a halo braid that shows the breadth of her back that's already accentuated by the cutout in her white dress. Her tan skin is covered in freckles that Katya wants to spend hours mapping out, kissing and leaving marks of her own. She knows her face is flushed when Trixie turns, but she ignores it and keeps walking toward her.

"This tree looks like a giant ass," Trixie has her phone out, the camera opened from taking a picture of the tree. Katya laughs hard, a brash sound that startles the man Jinkx is checking out at the counter. She hears Jinkx apologize, and quiets herself, shakes her head at Trixie and leans in for a kiss. It's chaste, nothing more than a peck, but Katya feels her heart in her throat anyway.

"It reminds me of yours," Katya murmurs against Trixie's lips, feels Trixie's smile so wide her lips brush against Trixie's teeth. Katya pulls back in time to see the man leave the shop and reaches around to give Trixie a quick swat on the globe of her ass. She steps away and winks, hikes her backpack further up her shoulder and waves to Jinkx. "I'll see you tomorrow!" Jinkx doesn't look up from the stack of orders she's sorting and waves halfheartedly.

Adore's head pops out from the curtain to the backroom, eyebrows raised and mouth curved into an easy grin, "Kat! You leaving?" She nods, and Adore waves a small pouch in the air, one that looks like a realistic fish that Katya gave her for Christmas the year before. She knows it holds a small green pipe, rolling papers, and weed. She grabs Trixie's hand, squeezes it lightly, "do you wanna smoke before we go? You don't have to. And I won't if it makes you uncomfortable." Her heart is back in her throat, this time in the way that makes her sick. Trixie has never said Katya's smoking bothered her, never even hinted at it, but Katya worries anyway. She supposes she could stop if Trixie wanted her to. Before she can ask and say something stupid, Trixie nods, smiles and says, "you'll have to teach me how."

* * *

 

"So, you're gonna hold it like this," Katya gently arranges Trixie's fingers around the pipe, places the pad of her thumb over the hole on the side of bowl and presses so Trixie can feel the raised edges, "this hole here is called the carb. Keep your thumb on it until you've inhaled, then you can take it off, okay?" She looks up from Trixie's hand, keeping her fingers wrapped loosely around Trixie's wrist. Her eyes are wide, pupils already blown and taking over the browns of her irises. She looks nervous and Katya can’t help herself when she moves forward on her knees where she's seated beside Trixie in the center of the couch, and presses a kiss to the center of Trixie's forehead. "Don't be nervous," her voice is soft even though she's sure Adore isn’t listening; had put on her headphones and settled on the floor across from them as soon as a joint was lit between her lips and the bowl was packed for Katya and Trixie to share. 

Trixie nods and Katya guides the green glass to her lips, watches closely as she wraps them around the mouthpiece. Katya's mouth curves into a small smile and she flicks the lighter, touches the flame to the corner of the bowl and says, "inhale now." Trixie breathes in quick and Katya knows instantly that it's too much, pulls the pipe away from Trixie's mouth before she can exhale into it and blow weed all over both of them. Trixie sputters, coughs hard and brings a hand to her mouth. She has tears in the corners of her eyes and Katya has to force herself to look away and grab a bottle of water from her backpack. 

"Oh, fucking Christ," Trixie inhales deep to catch her breath and triggers another round of coughing. Katya presses the bottle into Trixie's hands, watches silently as she composes herself and sips on the cool water. Even red-faced with a stray tear rolling down her cheek and muddling her makeup, Trixie is absolutely beautiful. She screws the lid back on and sets the bottle on the floor at her feet. All Katya can hear is the rattling of ice cubes against metal along with the raspy breaths slipping from Trixie's mouth. Katya lifts the pipe and takes a hit, exhales the sweet smoke with ease. She feels Trixie watching her with wide eyes, can feel the way she's staring at Katya's mouth. Her tongue pokes out to wet her own lips and Katya feels it deep in her stomach.

"Try it again?" Katya holds the pipe out for Trixie, grins when she takes it delicately from between Katya's fingers. She rests the warmed glass against her lips and breathes in less, slower than the first time, as Katya holds the small flame to the bowl. She exhales warmly into Katya's face and giggles, head leaning back against the couch and eyes closing as she keeps laughing. Katya takes the pipe back, takes another hit, long and slow because she _knows_ Trixie is watching her now, and holds it in her lungs. They start to burn. She cups the side of Trixie's face, can feel the tackiness of foundation against her palm and she slides her thumb along Trixie's bottom lip. She gathers up a drop of water lingering in the corner and presses downward until Trixie's mouth is sliding open. She leans in close, blows a steady stream of smoke between Trixie's plush, pink lips. She notices Trixie's eyes fluttering closed and presses their lips together, exhaling the rest of the smoke through her nose where it's pressed against Trixie's cheek. 

Trixie makes muffled noise against Katya's mouth; something between a groan and a whine mixed with Katya's name, and Katya feels it through her entire body, reverberating behind her teeth, weaving between her rib cage, and flowing out through her bare feet. She reaches blindly beside Trixie and sets the pipe on the table, uses her freed hand to hold the other side of Trixie's face, careful not to mess up her braid. She feels Trixie's arms wrap around her waist, fingers pressing into the thin cotton of her shirt and pulling her closer, urging Katya onto her lap. She moves clumsily, her knees getting stuck the a gap between the worn out sofa cushions before they're bracketing Trixie's wide hips and her ass is sat firm on Trixie's thighs. 

Trixie is so unlike anyone Katya's ever been with. They're so in sync; mouths opening and tongues slipping against each other in tandem, hands roaming to just the right places. It's always hot, filthy in a way that makes Katya feel dirty like she needs a shower and to go to confession for the first time in six years. Imagining the bishops back home and the looks on their faces when she says she wants this girl to tear her apart from the inside out brings her some kind of twisted joy. Trixie's mouth is delicious and Katya has dreamt about it since the day they met; the way her lips curve around words and straws and Katya's fingers haunts her in the best possible way. 

Trixie is rough, and Katya never expected that, not with how she looks like an absolute angel in her pink and yellow dresses and satin bows tied up in her hair. She nips at Katya's neck, sucks the delicate skin hard between her teeth and draws sounds from deep within that Katya didn't even know she had inside her, leaves beautiful little bruises that Katya loves staring at in the mirror but thankfully aren't hard to cover with concealer. After they fucked in the front hallway of Trixie's apartment, Trixie had pulled Katya into her bedroom, stripped her bare and absolutely devoured her; ate her out then fucked her slow and deep with a pastel purple strap on that she made Katya regret laughing at while whispering the most obscene things against the back of Katya's sweaty neck. She left a bruise there too, one Katya didn't know about until the following day when her hair was in pigtails and Adore pointed it out, congratulating and embarrassing her in the same breath.

Katya's skin is starting to buzz; she's floating and feels a gentle vibration just beneath her skin and everywhere she's touching Trixie. She presses her lips harder on Trixie's, opens her mouth wider. Trixie's hands slide from Katya t-shirt into the back pockets of her tight black jeans and she's pulling Katya closer, pressing her chest up against Katya's while she licks inside her mouth, behind perfect teeth. Katya's mind drifts, conjures up images of a future with Trixie where they're always kissing, languid and slow from the weed fogging their minds. She can see a future with Trixie so easily that it scares her. She could fall in love her; thinks she might have already, just a little bit. She draws back, laughs lightheartedly when Trixie's lips chase after hers. She traces the high point of Trixie's cheekbone with her thumb, whispers, "can you feel it?" She doesn't know exactly what she's asking; if Trixie can feel the fog settling from the weed or the invisible hands pushing them closer and closer to the edge, waiting for them to topple over into an impetuous romance that feels like crushed velvet and sticky honey covering their skin. 

Trixie nods and her eyes are locked on Katya's. She can feel them deep in her soul. Her hands drop, run up and down the soft, bare skin of Trixie's arms, lacing their fingers together when Trixie drops her hands from Katya's ass. She ducks her head and nuzzles her face against Trixie's neck, breathes in the sweet smell of her perfume and something smoky from her shift at the restaurant. She kisses the skin below Trixie's ear, the spot that had tore the most beautiful gasp from Trixie's throat the first time they fucked. Trixie stays silent this time and tips her head in the opposite direction, squeezes Katya's hands tight in hers. Katya wants so badly to tell her she thinks she's in love, can almost hear Trixie's laugh and her voice saying, " _I'll go rent a U-Haul while you adopt the cats_ ," in her head, but she stays silent too. It's too soon. 

* * *

Adore is gone when they untangle themselves from each other, and Katya assumes she's out on deliveries again. She can't remember her leaving. She holds the pipe for Trixie to take another hit, this one even larger than the last, and hits it twice herself while she watches Trixie adjust her dress that's slightly wrinkled from having Katya perched on her lap. Katya hopes she doesn't mind; she enjoys being held too much for it not to happen again. She slips on her TOMS, grabs her backpack and reaches out a hand for Trixie to take as soon as she's put on her white heart-shaped glasses. Her palm is cold when she slips it against Katya's, and she suddenly remembers shivering at all of Trixie's touches when she was laid out in her bed, and the bashful tone Trixie had when she apologized every time. "Your place?" Katya asks as they step out the back door, into an alley with two bicycles near the door that the store uses for deliveries and dumpsters lining the opposite wall. 

Trixie nods, hums quietly before saying, "I want some food." She swings their hands where they hang between them and Katya can't stop staring at her. Everything about her is beautiful; the way the sun creates highlights in her hair and make it look like an actual halo instead of just a braid, the profile of her face that makes her look like she belongs in a museum, hung up beside Cranach or Vermeer. Trixie catches her staring but doesn't speak, just grins down at Katya and shakes her head while they continue walking. They stop in front of a restaurant, Jimmy's Diner, and Trixie pulls Katya inside. It's cramped and loud, and Katya knows if she hadn't just smoked, she'd be an anxious wreck. Trixie orders two disco fries and strawberry milkshakes with no hesitation from the man at the counter, turns to Katya and says, "trust me," before digging in her purse for her garish hot pink wallet. Katya doesn't know what disco fries are, but she decides she does trust Trixie. She trusts her with a lot more than simple food choices. 

They finish their shakes on the walk to Trixie's apartment and Trixie talks loudly about the time she and Pearl stumbled into Jimmy's one morning for some hangover food, how it evolved into a tradition that whoever was awake first (or in better shape) after a night of partying got the fries and milkshakes. Katya listens to her rambling and loves every second of it; loves the way her laughs grow into screams, making other pedestrians stare, and the way she grips Katya's wrist to add emphasis to something she said. 

Trixie presses Katya up against the mirrored wall of the elevator as soon as the doors open, kisses her hard and quick, pulling away swiftly when the doors close and she realizes she hadn't pressed the button for the fifth floor. Katya doubles over laughing, says, "you're so stupid," and Trixie smacks her on the arm, murmurs, " _cunt_ ," low in her throat before she presses her back up against the wall and kisses her a little harder. The doors start to open on her floor, and she nips Katya's lower lip, smirks at her whine and exits into the hallway. Katya follows, and she'd ushered into the apartment before Trixie. She watches her hang her purse on an ornamental hook by the door and shove her keys and sunglasses in the front pocket.

Katya takes a moment to look around the apartment; takes in the white sectional that's covered in pink and shimmering gold pillows and placed beneath a window that's framed by sheer white linen curtains. There's a pastel pink cabinet beneath the TV, holding a record player and her Mammillaria. Fairy lights are strung up on the wall over the TV and across the room near a bookshelf, and candles scattered over nearly every surface. Katya knows it must be beautiful at night; all the lights turned off except the delicate strings and the lit candles casting a warm glow over the room. Everything looks pristine, like it's a room straight out of an interior design magazine published just for Barbie Dolls. It screams  _Trixie_ , and Katya can't help but wonder if Pearl has the same love for pink or if she just didn't mind Trixie decorating her way. 

Katya jumps when Trixie puts her hand heavy on her shoulder, mumbles an embarrassed, "fuck off," when Trixie laughs. Trixie shakes her head and grins, "couch?" Katya nods, puts down her backpack and slips off her shoes by the door when she notices Trixie had removed her strappy heels. She follows Trixie to the couch and hands her the bag of food once she's seated. She pulls her legs up, mirrors the way Trixie is sitting in the corner of the deep cushions. Katya can see a small flash of Trixie's light pink panties where her dress has fallen open and it makes her feel hot, twists something up inside and she wishes she hadn't taken that last hit because maybe then she could stop staring. Trixie tears into the bag, pulls out two styrofoam containers and sighs heavily, "they didn't give us any forks." She's adorably put out, her voice coming out in a whine and her lips curled into a small pout. 

"I got it," Katya's up off the couch and walking into the kitchen before she realizes she has no idea where anything is kept. Just as she's about to start opening drawers, she hears Trixie call out, " _third drawer on the left._ " The sound of a scratch and trilling horns floats into the kitchen from the living room, and Katya walks in to see Trixie in front of the turquois record player. She's swaying her hips in time to the music and she twirls, meets Katya's eyes as she starts to sing along; _I'm so high and so dry, I'm sailin' in the sky. Just blow some gage, I'm on a rampage. Jack, I'm mellow._ She grabs Katya's bicep, throws her head back and cackles. Katya can't help but join her, feeling light inside like she did the first time they met or every time they kiss. Trixie leans in and Katya thinks she's going to kiss her again, she closes her eyes and Trixie snatches a fork from her hand, releasing her arm and returning to the couch with another boisterous laugh. Katya opens her eyes and Trixie is watching her with her eyebrows raised, waiting.

* * *

Katya wakes up to the sound of a phone vibrating on a table. The light has shifted in the room, painting rainbows on the wall across from her. Trixie curses above her, whispers, "sorry," and leans over to silence it, jostling Katya's head that she's just now realizing is resting on Trixie's lap. Her hand in in Katya's hair, long fingers scratching at her scalp then flowing through the ends of her hair. Katya turns so she's on her back, glances up at Trixie and smiles. She looks like an angel again; maybe still. "Have a nice nap?" her face is twisted up into a grin and Katya laughs, brings a hand up to rub the sleep from her eyes. She nods silently and sits up, leaning into Trixie's side when she's upright.

Katya remembers yawning several times after they'd eaten and Trixie laughing, asking if she needed a nap. She doesn't remember much after that. She notices that the TV is on now; a rerun of Friends playing, the one with Ross and all the margaritas, muted with the subtitles floating across the screen. Trixie's arm wraps around her shoulders like it's the most natural thing in the world. Maybe it is for her too. "What time is it?"

"Just after six. I was about to wake you, but Pearl did it for me," she grins and Katya's stomach swoops. She kisses the side of Katya's head, her free hand cupping her jaw and moving Katya's head so she can kiss her lips. She pulls back, whispers, "you make the cutest little noises when you sleep. Like a little baby whale." She laughs, loud, and her body shakes with it. Katya briefly wonders if she had been moaning in her sleep, but she realizes she doesn't care. Trixie's hand doesn't leave Katya's face, her thumb gently strokes along Katya's cheekbone; mirroring what Katya had done back at the shop. "Let me do your makeup." It isn't a question, but Katya says yes anyway.

Trixie sits so close to Katya, close enough for Katya to feel her breath puffing over her face, and uses a fancy liquid liner to draw wings sharper than Katya's ever been able to manage. She lines Katya's lips with her usual red, overdrawing them slightly on the top before filling them in with a deep burgundy that Katya can't for the life of her imagine Trixie ever wearing. It's intimate and Katya tries hard not to let on to how fast her heart is beating or how sweaty her palms are where they're placed stiffly on her thighs. When Trixie finishes, Katya strips off her clothes in the middle of Trixie's bedroom, lays them out neatly across the bed while Trixie watches her reflection through the vanity mirror. Trixie's face is flushed and Katya wishes they had more time before the show. Her back is to Trixie when she slips the dress over her lacy black bra and thong, and she misses the way Trixie's eyes linger a little too long on the curve of her ass.

Trixie insists on letting Katya borrow a pair of shoes; chunky yellow heels covered in soft velvet that match her dress perfectly. They're a half size too big, but Katya loves them and wears them anyway. She loves the thought of sharing things with Trixie; their shoes, clothes, and makeup, even if it's a little unsanitary. She wants to wrap herself up in clothes that smell like Trixie's laundry detergent, or just _Trixie_ if she wore them the day before. Even in the heels, Katya is shorter than Trixie. She loves that too.

The Lyft picks them up in front of Trixie's building, and when Katya opens the door for Trixie, the pretty flush is back on her cheeks. Trixie sits in the middle seat, Katya's hand resting on her thigh, over her white dress because she doesn't know how far she can push Trixie just yet. She smiles at Katya with a look in her eye and a raised brow that Katya knows means it's okay, Katya could go further, but she doesn't. She keeps her hand light, leaves it a tease, and she finally feels like she has the upper hand. Trixie takes it back in the dim lighting of the theater when she traces patterns over Katya's dress along the inside of her thigh with the sharp tip of her nail. Katya spreads her legs wider and Trixie withdraws her hand, chuckles quietly in a way that's completely out of place among the somber music.

* * *

Katya cries during the second act. She cries _a lot_. Her heart breaks for the boy on stage; his desire to find love, the pain he feels, the isolation. It was too real. She hadn't expected to feel so much, even when Trixie had warned her, " _it's a little heavy_ ," when they were in their seats. Trixie hands her a tissue from her purse and grips her hand until the worst of it is over, gently reminding her to be careful with the skin below her eyes when she wipes them a little too harshly. When the show is over and they're searching for an open coffee shop, Trixie brings it up. She's swinging their joined hands again like she had earlier in the day, before Katya's nap and before her heart was ripped out of her chest and destroyed by a fictional boy named Evan, "you okay?" Katya looks from the street in front of her to Trixie and shrugs. She doesn't know.

"I mean, it brought up a lot of old feelings," she looks around and sees that all the shops they pass are closed for the night. She feels Trixie tense beside her, places her free hand over their joined ones and looks at Trixie the best she can in the dark, "I loved it. I did. It was like reliving my entire adolescence again, but with better clothes and music."  A raindrop splashes over her forehead and she feels it through her bangs. "There's a real lack of accurate portrayals of mental illness in the media, you know? If I had seen this, I don't know, six or seven years ago? It would've changed my life. Maybe every panic attack wouldn't have felt so big because I would _actually_ know what the hell was going on and I wouldn't have tried to-" she cuts herself off, shakes her head and continues quieter than before, "Honestly, Trixie. Think of the dialogue this could start for the young people who don't have the words to describe what exactly they're feeling. It's so important."

She glances over at Trixie, sees her smile and feels it settle inside her chest. They walk three more blocks in silence, and when the lights of Times Square come into view and the rain has turned from a few drops into a steady drizzle, Trixie says, "I agree with you. Things weren't too great when I was growing up and seeing that would've helped me too, I think. Maybe." Her face is twisted into a small frown and Katya doesn't want to pry, not when it's something that still hurts. The rain starts to come down in sheets. They can't find a coffee shop that's open, not this late on a Tuesday, so Trixie offers to make them coffee at her place. While they wait for a Lyft beneath the awning of an empty shop, Trixie kisses Katya on the cheek, leaves a pink smudge beside her ear and says, "I think Pearl might be staying at her girlfriend's tonight," like it's a secret not meant for anyone but Katya and an invitation all rolled up in one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song Trixie sings is Jack, I'm Mellow by Trixie Smith, and the musical she takes Katya to is Dear Evan Hansen; a show that made me cry buckets when I saw it.


	6. Chapter Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> come say hi on tumblr! [@katyazeroni](https://katyazeroni.tumblr.com/)

The elevator is silent up to the fifth floor. Katya's overly conscious of the fact that Trixie isn't touching her, that she's two feet away with her lips curved into a small smirk. Katya wants to reach out and touch, grab Trixie's ass and haul her up against the mirrored wall and kiss her so hard their lips bruise. She faces Trixie, and her eyes are unwavering where they're focused on the glowing orange numbers above the door ticking from 3 to 4, ignoring Katya until she starts to move closer, stretches her hand out toward Trixie. "Wait," Trixie's voice is even, and she's still not looking at Katya. Katya wishes more than anything that she would. The click of their heels in the hallway sends electricity down Katya's spine with every step, kindles the fire growing hotter deep in her belly. She wraps a hand around Trixie's wrist at the door, kisses the back of her neck as she slides her pink house key into the doorknob, and then the deadbolt. When Trixie pulls her hand from Katya's grasp and turns, saying, " _Katya_ ," in a warning voice, Katya feels it go right to her cunt. 

Trixie's mouth is hot on Katya's as soon as they're inside the apartment, her tongue forcing its way beside Katya's behind her teeth and against the roof of her mouth. Katya knows she's moaning, pathetic breathy sounds are getting trapped in her throat, but she can't think when Trixie is surrounding her in every possible way. She has Katya's arms above her head, pinned against the closed door by her wrists. Trixie pulls her mouth away, gives Katya an impish grin and releases her arms, steps away completely. She takes long strides toward her bedroom, calls, "c'mon," over her shoulder and Katya hurries after her, stepping out of her heels and lifting her dress over her head, tossing it onto the chair just inside Trixie's bedroom door. She watches Trixie undress, stares when she unzips her dress and lets it fall around her ankles before kicking it away with the toe of her white pump. She wasn't wearing a bra beneath her dress, and Katya should've realized considering the open back, but the thought never even crossed her mind. Trixie's panties join her dress on the floor after she slips off her heels, but Katya can't look away from her large areolas and stiff nipples.

Trixie sways her hips as she walks, comes closer to Katya and she is so beautiful; smooth, tanned skin and curves Katya fell in love with the first time she saw Trixie. She slowly lifts her hands to unclasp Katya's bra, slides it down her arms and tosses it onto the chair. She hooks her thumbs into the band of Katya's thong, pulls her close by the hips and kisses her deep like before, walks Katya backwards until her ass is pressed against the foot of Trixie's bed. She pulls the thong down Katya's thighs, squats and helps her step out of it. Trixie's hands are cold when they trace back up Katya's legs, curve around to Katya's ass and pull her close. She's talking, but Katya doesn't hear her at first; can only hear her own ragged breathing, the hammering of her heart, and the rain pounding on the windows until she registers Trixie's voice saying, "I never thought I'd be into the retro porn star pubes, but I kind of love it. Maybe it's just 'cause it's you." She drags her fingers up through the curly brown hair covering Katya's mound, tugs hard, then her palms are on Katya's shoulders and she's pushing her back onto the white quilt with that same wicked look in her eyes. Katya scoots clumsily up the mattress, stops when she's leaning against a pillow covered in faux fur.

Trixie crawls up over her body, legs bracketing Katya's thighs while her breath ghosts over the shadows of Katya's rib cage. She presses closed mouth kisses to the underside of Katya's breast, gentle over her overheated skin, while her fingers slip in between Katya's folds. She's wet; can feel how soaked she is when Trixie's fingers slip effortlessly up to her clit. It's not enough pressure, not even close, but it's Trixie giving it to her so she moans, cants her hips up and hopes Trixie will give her more. She does, rubs slow, firm circles around Katya's clit with the pads of her fingers before shifting them back down to her hole. "Can you hear how wet you already are? Dripping for me." Trixie's voice is wrecked already, and Katya can tell Trixie's trying to tease her but it doesn't work, only turns her on more. Two of Trixie's fingers dip inside, stretching Katya's entrance with only the tips of her fingers. Katya can't remember the last time she was so desperate for a girl's fingers.

"Trixie," Katya tries to shove her hips down onto Trixie's fingers, "Trixie, _please_ , please fuck me." Trixie laughs, murmurs _okay, baby_ hot against Katya's skin and fucks her fingers in hard. Katya's hands are in Trixie's hair, pulling out pieces from her braid, and shoving Trixie's face against her stomach. " _Thank you, thank you, thank you!_ " She says it like a mantra when Trixie moves down her body, ducks her head and licks around where her fingers are thrusting in and out of Katya's pussy. Her tongue circles Katya's clit and she sucks hard on the swollen nub, pulls the most primal sounds from Katya. She can feel them tearing out of her lungs. There's sweat, saliva, her own fluids running down her ass, dripping onto the quilt below her while her chest heaves with every breath she sucks in. Trixie's fingers don't slow, and Katya cries out loud, curses, when a third is slipped in alongside the others, the stretch painfully intoxicating. She comes hard, back arching up off the bed and fingers curling tight into Trixie's hair. Trixie keeps her fingers inside Katya's cunt, doesn't stop thrusting them or the steady pattern of licking and sucking until Katya is pulling hard at her hair and whining loudly.

Trixie's face is a mess; her lipstick is smudged across her cheek and her face is shining wet in the dim orange light coming from the lamp on the bedside table. She says something but Katya’s ears are ringing. She nods, hopes it's an okay response, and Trixie laughs, moves back up Katya's body and kisses her. "Did I break you?" Trixie is teasing again, and this time Katya hears it. Her face is hot, feels like fire under Trixie's gaze and she doesn't think she could make her vocal chords work even if her life depended on it. Trixie's mouth is on her neck, her shoulder, _everywhere_ , licking and sucking kisses while Katya's pulse returns to normal. She's straddling Katya's thigh, grinding against her, and Katya slides her hand between their bodies over Trixie's smooth lips. Her hips keep moving in slow circles against Katya's fingers, never wavering, and she's taking again, just like before. Katya loves the way Trixie takes what she wants from her, the way she chases after her own pleasure selfishly.

Trixie is gasping quietly beside Katya's ear and her thighs are starting to tremble. Katya puts her hand on the small of Trixie's back, feels the way her bones shift beneath layers of skin and muscle against one palm while the other is covered in Trixie's wetness. "So beautiful," Katya says it against the sweaty skin of Trixie's neck, drags her hand down to Trixie's ass and teases the tips of her fingers along the crease where Trixie's ass meets the tops of her thighs. She pinches the skin roughly, bites down on Trixie's shoulder when she whines, and Trixie is coming too, loud moans and expletives coming from her lips until her hips still and she's sliding off of Katya's thigh onto the bed beside her. Katya wipes her hand on her stomach and rolls to face Trixie. Her eyes are closed, brow wrinkled, and Katya reaches out to brush the hairs she pulled from Trixie's braid off of her forehead. "Beautiful," she repeats herself and catches a hit of a smile cross Trixie's lips. Katya kisses the tip of Trixie's nose, her chin, whispers, "don't fall asleep on me, honey. I have a hitachi in my backpack." Trixie's eyes flicker open and she's laughing, pulling Katya closer by a hand on the back of her neck and giving her a sloppy kiss.

* * *

The room is dark except for the dim blue light coming from the essential oil diffuser in the corner of the room, circulating jasmine and bergamot through the air. It had been silent after taking separate showers, Katya climbing into bed and thinking Trixie was asleep until she rolled over and wrapped herself around Katya. "My stepdad was abusive," Trixie's voice is soft in Katya's ear, floating up from where her head is pillowed on Katya's bare chest. Trixie snuggles closer, "My brother, Austin, is four years younger than me and I… I tried my best to protect him from it," Katya wraps her arms tighter around Trixie, doesn't know what prompted Trixie to share this now, but has a feeling she knows where it's going and feels her heart breaking, "but some nights I would hear him crying in his room."

Her voice cracks and Katya can feel Trixie's tears rolling onto her chest but she doesn't speak, doesn't know what she could say that would make the memories feel any lighter in Trixie's heart. "I never went in there to check on him, and I hate myself for it," she sniffles, clears her throat, and the tears keep coming, "but I didn't want to know if he did the same things to Austin that he did to me." Trixie shakes her head, "I couldn't know." Katya feels the implications of Trixie's words settle heavy like stones in her gut and she wants to scream, _cry_ , fly to Wisconsin and make sure that man never lays another finger on Trixie or her brother again. She runs her fingers through Trixie's damp hair that smells like flowers, hopes it's as soothing for her as it was when she scratched gently at Katya’s scalp.

She holds Trixie while she cries; sobs that shake her entire body, taper into silent tears, and eventually stop all together. She holds Trixie until she's fallen asleep and her breaths are coming evenly over Katya's tacky, tear-stained skin. She lets a few tears of her own fall, then; cries for the beautiful little girl who had her childhood ripped away by a man she should've been able to trust. She wishes she'd known Trixie then, that she could've saved her from the pain and fear she had to have felt. It's illogical and Katya knows it. She would've been a child herself. She holds Trixie tighter, makes a silent promise that she'll always keep Trixie safe. No one will hurt her ever again.

Katya doesn't sleep that night; can't when all she can think of is Trixie's arduous past and when images flash behind her eyelids of a sad little girl with blond pigtails and dark bruises. She lies awake until the sun is coming up, filtering through the soft pink curtains and making it look like a child's bedroom, all pastel pinks and delicate fabrics. It's a distressing contradiction of the heaviness in the atmosphere around them. Carefully untangling herself from Trixie, where her chest is pressed against Trixie's naked back and her leg is between Trixie's thighs under layers of blankets, she climbs out of bed, puts on her bra and panties, wincing when she bends and her knees crack too loudly. She tiptoes out of the bedroom to search for her phone and the apartment is quiet except for the low hum of the air conditioner and the early morning traffic on the street below. A dog barks in a nearby apartment and it's still much quieter than Katya's apartment has ever been.

Katya spots her purse on the couch, pulls out her phone and clicks it on. It's just after 5:30. She has two texts from Adore, the first received at 2:15, asking if Katya has her pipe and if she could please bring it into the store if she does, and the second from two minutes later, apologizing for potentially interrupting any fucking that may have been happening. Katya isn't on the schedule, but knows how attached Adore is to the blown glass she affectionately calls _mijo_. Katya texts back _Mijo is safe with me. I'll be there around 3_ , and ignores the second text all together. She slips her phone back into her purse, trades it for a vintage cigarette case made of tin with an old Soviet propaganda poster printed on the front along with the words, " _we grow under the sun of our country,_ " in bold, black letters. It was her mother's; Katya had stolen it from her hope chest that was kept in the basement when she was sixteen and had started smoking with her friends behind the gym at school. Inside she has four neatly rolled blunts, tiny printed fruits on each of them signifying the flavor of paper.

She picks one covered in peaches and smokes it on Trixie's balcony, sitting in a black metal chair with her legs pulled up to her chest. It's just on the uncomfortable side of cold outside, too cold for just a bra and panties, and she's covered in goosebumps. She watches the sun rise further up in the cloudless sky, until it's peeking over the roof of the building across the street and shining into her eyes. It's hardly believable that there was a rainstorm the night before. Her eyes slip shut and she takes one drag after another, waits patiently for the high to hit. She thinks maybe she'll make Trixie some breakfast, coffee at the very least, considering they didn't get a chance to have any last night. The door slides open and she smiles, keeps her eyes closed against the sun as light footsteps approach her. "Hey," it's a voice that doesn't belong to Trixie, and Katya's eyes snap open, her legs fall to the cement below her. Pearl is watching her with a small smirk, her eyes tracing over Katya's body before coming back up to her face. She sits in the chair across from Katya, doesn’t break eye contact when she kicks her feet up onto the table, crossing them at the ankle.

"Hi," Katya's voice is quiet, she feels small. Exposed. It's the first time she's been able to really look at Pearl, apart from their brief interaction at the coffee shop and the few pictures of her and Trixie hanging on the refrigerator. She is unfairly beautiful for 6 o'clock in the morning, has her hair pulled up into a bun, wrapped in braids and a red scarf. Her makeup is nearly perfect and her floral maxi dress drapes around her body delicately. She's stunning, and it makes Katya feel so inadequate. She notices Pearl eyeing the spliff between her fingers and reaches for the tin, holds it open in offering to Pearl. The smirk is back when she plucks out one of the joints and the lighter shoved in beside it. She takes a long drag, exhales up into the air and watches the smoke dissipate before placing the joint back on her lips.

"So, you stayed the night," she says around the tip. It isn't a question. Katya nods once, watches Pearl take another drag. Katya pulls her legs back up onto the chair, hyper-aware of how small her panties are and that she could end up flashing Pearl if she isn't careful. "Trix really likes you, you know," Pearl ashes the joint over the table, "won't shut up about you." The ashes are picked up by the wind, blown across the glass, and for a moment Katya wonders how she could possibly be friends with someone like Trixie; someone who is so considerate and whose happiness is infectious. But she can hear a fondness in Pearl's voice at the mention of Trixie, and maybe there's more to her than the arrogance, her blank stare, and a beautiful face.

"I like her too," Katya has to relight her half-smoked joint, exhales the smoke as she speaks, "I've never met anyone like her." Pearl nods, stays quiet, and Katya is instantly reminded of Adore. In the back of her mind she thinks maybe they'd get on well.

"You have a huge hickey on your tit," Pearl says it in the most impassive tone Katya's ever heard, and it takes a moment for her mind to catch up to the words. When she does, she tucks her chin, and sees a purple mark the size of Trixie's mouth on her left breast that makes her face heat up. Trixie had kissed her there gently, said, " _your heart is pounding_ ," then sucked the skin into her mouth while her fingers pumped in and out of Katya's cunt. She hopes the bruise takes weeks to fade, peeks out from the cup of her bra like this until Trixie decides to give her another one. Pearl laughs, low and warm, like she somehow heard Katya's thoughts. "Is the sex that good?"

Katya feels her face flush harder, can't make any words leave her mouth so she shrugs and looks away, stares directly into the sun like she knows she shouldn't. She doesn’t want to tell Pearl that Trixie is the best she's ever been with, that the night before she had made Katya come more times than she cares to count, or that she tastes so sweet and Katya wants her face permanently stuck between her thick thighs. Pearl laughs again, louder than before, coming from deep within her belly. She takes a drag, says, "well, shit, man," around the smoke.

* * *

They sit in silence, Pearl finishing her joint long before Katya even though she was already halfway through hers when Pearl appeared. She waits outside until Katya is done, leans her head back into the sunlight and Katya is mesmerized by the way it illuminates the highlight brushed over her sharp cheekbones. Pearl slides the door shut behind Katya once they're back inside, draws the curtains closed, and kicks her heels off in separate directions. "Trix sleeps late if she doesn't have to work," she yawns into her palm, starts to untie the scarf from her head as she walks toward a closed door off the living room, "you'll have to wake her up if you wanna see her before noon." She walks into her bedroom and shuts the door behind her without another word.

Katya stands in the center of the living room, buries her toes into the plush white rug and looks around. The bottom shelf of a bookcase is full of records, and she plops herself down to look through them. They're not in any particular order, and Katya has to resist the urge to alphabetize them. There's Dolly Parton and Patsy Cline, Loretta Lynn shoved in between Jewel and Sheryl Crow. Those are Trixie's, Katya is sure. She pulls Natalie Merchant from her place beside Melissa Etheridge, crawls on her knees to place it on the turntable that's still open from the day before. It's the album _Tigerlily_ ; and Katya remembers being six years old and listening to it in the car with her mother, buckled up in the back seat of a white Jeep that had tan leather seats and singing along, not understanding what a single word meant.

" _Mishka_ ," her mom would say, " _when you fall in love, you will understand_." Katya keeps the volume low and spreads out on the rug, stares up at the ceiling and listens to the album until she's back in West Roxbury, in the yellow house she grew up in on the corner of Maple and Chilton. She can smell her mother's borscht simmering in the kitchen, smoke from her father's pipe floating out from under the door of his office, and her heart is aching. She's homesick, wishes she could call her mom and tell her she might be in love now. She finally understands. If a few tears fall from the corner of her eyes, roll across her temples and into her hair, she ignores them.

* * *

 The record ends, casts the room in a scratchy silence and Katya decides it's late enough to wake Trixie. In the kitchen, she finds that Trixie and Pearl don't have a coffee maker. There's a turquoise kettle on the stove (the same shade as the record player, and Katya knows that couldn't have been an accident) and white ceramic pour-over cone on the counter beside it that Katya has to watch an instructional video on her phone to learn how to use. The pantry has several airtight canisters holding different flavored coffees, and Katya decides on hazelnut for both of them because she remembers the faint taste of it on Trixie's lips when they kissed in front of the coffee shop. She adds cream into Trixie's mug and watches through the transparent glass as it swirls together with the strong coffee.

Katya carefully sets the mugs down on the bedside table, climbs back under the covers and cuddles up close against Trixie's back. She's snoring softly; small puffs of breath out through her parted lips, her chest rising and falling slowly when Katya wraps an arm around her. She moves Trixie's hair up off of her neck and presses chaste kisses over the freckles she hadn't seen until the day before. "Trixie, honey," she keeps her voice quiet and kisses behind Trixie's ear, "I have coffee." She feels Trixie stirring and kisses her two more times, the last falling on the nob of her spine at the base of her neck. She smells like clean laundry, flowers, and sleep. Katya can't get enough of it. Trixie sighs, rolls onto her back and smiles sleepily up at Katya. She has to stop herself from tracing the soft lines of Trixie's face with her middle finger, leaves her arm resting over Trixie's bare chest instead. "Good morning," she kisses Trixie, a proper peck on the lips, and draws back with a smile.

"What time is it?" Trixie's voice is sleep-rough, slurring, and Katya kind of loves it. She imagines what it would be like hearing that voice ten years from now, in a bed of their own. Her heart is back in her throat.

"Just after 8," Katya nuzzles her face against the side of Trixie's head, breathes in deep against her temple. Trixie's hand is in Katya's hair, long fingers brushing through the knots at the back of her head. "I made coffee," her voice is muffled against Trixie's hair, "was gonna make you breakfast but I didn't know what you liked." Trixie chuckles, turns to face Katya and rubs their noses against each other. Her breath is warm where it's sweeping over Katya's face. She kisses the corner of Katya's mouth and starts to sit up, forcing Katya's arm to fall down around her waist before she does the same.

They drink their coffee propped up against the grey tufted headboard, and when Trixie tells Katya she smells like weed, Katya relays the entire morning to her. She learns that Pearl will often come home from Violet's well after the sun has started to rise. Katya doesn't tell her about Natalie Merchant, the hour she spent on the rug listening to her, or the tears that tracked their way to the back of her head. The record is tucked back in its place, beside Melissa and Norah Jones, among the crooners and songwriters Trixie and Pearl have collected.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mishka, or Мышка, is a common Russian pet name meaning little mouse


	7. Chapter Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> come say hi on tumblr! [@katyazeroni](https://katyazeroni.tumblr.com/)

Trixie's birthday party is held on a Tuesday night. She insists that her golden birthday happen on the actual day, and Katya doesn't feel any guilt when she tells Jinkx that she and Adore won't be at work the following Wednesday. She can hear the bassline from the music the second the elevator doors open to Trixie's floor. It pounds through her ears, settles in her chest, and fills her with something akin to anxiety. Adore is beside her, loops her arm through Katya's for balance when she takes a particularly long stride and teeters on her too-tall heels. They're late.

She feels overdressed; the crushed velvet of her gold romper and the body chain are too tight, constricting, even, and Katya wishes she could go back home and change. The fact that she doesn't own any other gold pieces to fit the theme doesn't slip her mind, but she tries to let it. She doesn't bother knocking on the door, knows the music is much too loud for anyone to hear over. The apartment is dim; lit only by fairy lights, candles, and a strobe flashing to the beat of the music in the corner. She feels the music more than hears it and watches people dance where a coffee table and chair used to be placed in the living room. She spots Trixie in the kitchen doing shots with Pearl. Trixie catches her eye as she slides a lime wedge between her teeth, grimacing before waving Katya and Adore into the room.

"Baby, hi!" Trixie wraps her arms around Katya's middle, kisses her sloppily and the taste of tequila is sharp on her tongue. She pulls back and draws a finger down the plunging neckline of Katya's romper with a grin. Her finger loops around the thin gold chain beneath, "I love this." She looks like a princess, Katya thinks, with the halter cut of her dress and the tulle skirt ending beneath her knees, golden like the highlights in her hair. There's a small tiara on the crown of her head, nestled in with loose curls that Katya watched her carefully form that morning over FaceTime. She presses a drink into Katya's hand and a kiss to her cheek, does the same to Adore and tells them, "go! Mingle! Have fun!"

They get too drunk that night, Katya's memories being limited to those that were documented on Instagram and in the camera rolls of her new friends. She wakes up on the living room floor, to Trixie's front pressed against hers and Adore cuddled up to her back, and three takeout boxes of disco fries and milkshakes being placed on the floor by Pearl and Violet ( _and Katya vaguely remembers meeting her; the way she had wrapped her hands around Violet's waist to see if her fingers could touch on the other side. They couldn't._ )

An Instagram post made by Adore seven minutes after three that morning tells Katya that Trixie is officially her girlfriend. They laugh hard and long when they realize that neither one of them knows exactly how that conversation went.

* * *

"Tell me about that new girl of yours," Katya's voice is hoarse as she exhales smoke into the air. She's seated on the floor, her back pressed against the large sectional that Adore is lounging across. The air is smoky throughout the apartment and Katya's eyes are burning, but she feels loose. Happy. "The older woman. _Bianca_ ," Katya says her name slow, lets every syllable roll off her tongue like she can taste it.

"B?" Adore laughs, scratches her blunt nails against Katya's scalp, "she's a cunt." Katya tilts her head back and watches a smile spread over Adore's face. She tugs lightly on the ends of Katya's hair, silently asking for the pipe. Katya passes it to her, curses when she drops the lighter somewhere behind her head. Adore's laugh rings through the air again.

"Well, do you like her?" Katya twists her torso and rests her face against Adore's thigh. She's sitting up now, and glances down at Katya before she takes a hit. Katya rubs her cheek back and forth over Adore's jeans. They're scratchy against Katya's skin, but in a good way that numbs her skin or sets her nerves on fire. She can't decide which. Smoke circles her head and she lets her eyes slip closed against the harsh cloud.

"We have fun together," Adore's hand is back in Katya's hair, this time ruffling her bangs before her finger traces down to the tip of Katya's nose and it's gone. Her eyes are still closed and she smiles. She wishes she'd known Adore before a year ago; that she was actually Katya's little sister instead of some girl that was shoved into her life by Jinkx and has become more of a fixture than Katya could've ever anticipated.

"Having fun is good," her eyes flicker open and they're unfocused for a moment. Adore is watching her, the pipe clutched in her palm. The wall behind the couch is painted black, and in the dim room it melds into Adore's hair, the leather of the couch, and her dark denim. The sun is starting to set behind Katya's back, she can tell the sky has turned a brilliant orange by the reflection in Adore's glasses. She nods and the reflected light bounces from orange to pink with the shift of her head.

Adore hums, low in her throat, "mhmm." She corners the lighter over the bowl and inhales on the glass. Katya can tell the conversation is over, that Adore must be serious about Bianca if she's being purposefully vague about whatever kind of relationship they have. She takes the pipe out of Adore's hand, hits it while it's still cherried. "Are you and Trixie having fun?"

Katya can't keep the grin off her face, "I really like her. I like spending time with her," Katya sighs, sets the pipe carefully on the floor, "fucking her." She laughs loud, boisterous, and hears Adore laughing above her. "God, I love fucking her," she lays back, stretches out over the cool wood floor, "her mouth, _fuck_." She feels heat low in her stomach thinking about Trixie's tongue, the way she fucks Katya so good with it and shoves it in her mouth afterwards so Katya can taste.

"Gross," Katya can hear the smile in Adore's voice and kicks her leg up onto the couch to nudge her. Her cold toes dig into Adore's side.

It's completely dark outside and Katya is pleasantly buzzed and tipsy on beer when Bianca calls Adore. Katya tries to get her to put the call on speaker, begs and yells into the phone that's sandwiched between Adore's ear and shoulder, and Adore flips her off before heading out to her fire escape. The open window lets in a rush of hot, humid air that has Katya sucking in a deep breath. It's unusually warm for October, and Katya's grateful she's staying the night and won't have to deal with the subway and all of its sweaty passengers.

Adore stretches out on the floor beside Katya when she comes back. Her face is flushed from the heat, maybe a little from talking to Bianca. Katya reaches blindly for Adore's hand, threads their fingers together and shuts her eyes.

* * *

On the first day of December, Katya woke up to Trixie's side of her bed empty and the shower in the attached bathroom running. Trixie's voice echoed quietly into the bedroom, singing fragments of songs Katya didn't recognize. Her voice was beautiful. A glance out the window told her it was still snowing, adding to the few inches of snow that was already blanketing the streets at midnight when Katya went out onto the balcony to smoke with Pearl before bed.

She couldn't bring herself to get out of bed, chose instead to stay curled up beneath layers of blankets and watch the big white flakes floating against the grey sky while Trixie's voice sang pretty love songs. Katya liked to believe Trixie knew she was awake and sang them just for her. Trixie got out of the shower with warm skin wrapped up in a fluffy robe, smelling like milk and honey body wash. She straddled Katya on the mattress, pinned her wrists to the pillow beside her head and kissed her hard. It brought back flashes of the night before; when Trixie had her tied up helpless and rode the strap on that was buckled too tight against Katya's hipbones. Trixie climbed off of her with a laugh as soon as she had Katya moaning against her teeth. She left Katya wanting so much more than they had time for.

Katya watches Trixie dress for work, sitting up against the headboard with the pink sheets and white quilt draped over her bare skin. Trixie moves around the room deftly, slipping a sweater on over her dress and tying a ribbon into a neat bow around her ponytail once she's sitting at her vanity. The table is white, covered in perfume bottles, lotions, and more makeup than Katya would ever know what to do with. She loves that about Trixie; the way she is irrefutably feminine, loves everything pink and girly and is entirely unapologetic about it. Their eyes meet in the mirror and Trixie smiles that smile that makes Katya's heart feel so full she's afraid it might burst. "If you want, there's some coffee from earlier and soy milk in the fridge."

Katya cocks her head, squints at Trixie through the mirror, "in the fridge? Here?" Trixie hates soy milk. The first time she had stayed the night at Katya's and found a disturbing lack of flavored creamer or anything containing lactose in the fridge, she said she’d rather have dry cereal and black coffee than go anywhere near the stuff. She bought soy milk just for Katya. 

Trixie sighs, sweeps a fluffy brush over her cheek, "Katya, I really don't have the time to explain grocery stores to you right now." Her tone is biting, exasperated, but the small smile quirking at the corners of her lips gives her away. Katya is up and out of the bed, draping her nude body along Trixie's back and hugging her tight. She kisses below Trixie's right ear, whispers, "I’m so in love with you."

A pretty pink flush spreads over Trixie's cheeks and down her neck as she shakes her head. "You're so stupid," she twists her arm around, knots her hand in the sleep-mussed hair at the back of Katya's head, and hauls her in for a kiss. It's new, full of so much love that Katya feels tears pressing behind her eyes. "I love you too," Trixie's words are muffled against Katya's lips.

Trixie leaves for work just after noon, bundled up in a heavy wool coat and scarf, tights beneath her dress. As soon as the door shuts heavy behind her, the gravity of the words Katya said comes crashing down around her. She puts on the leggings she wore the day before and one of Trixie's hoodies, a pink one from Victoria's Secret that's well-worn and smells like Trixie's fabric softener. Her heart is pounding in her chest and she suddenly feels out of place in Trixie's apartment, like she takes up too much space in the delicately decorated rooms and if she touches anything it will crumble beneath her fingertips, leaving a bigger mess than Trixie deserves. She paces the long length of the hallway, her feet sticking with sweat on the floor. There's a fire truck wailing on the street below but she barely hears it. She needs to get out. She laces her boots too tight and locks the door after she closes it too hard behind her. She realizes in the elevator, halfway down to the first floor, that she doesn't have her bag or her phone, just a key ring with Trixie's purple house key standing out among the plain brass ones belonging to Katya's apartment and mailbox.

She ends up at the shop, freezing her ass off because she hadn't thought to grab a coat, and even though it's her day off, she goes inside. Adore is lounging on the stool behind the counter, scrolling listlessly through her phone. Her long black hair is gathered up into a messy bun on the top of her head with a small orange flower stuck in the side, a flannel top is thrown over an old band shirt Katya's seen her wear a thousand times. She envies Adore's style; wishes she could pull off the 90s grunge look with daisy dukes and fishnet stockings or a pair of ripped up jeans. Adore doesn't look up right away when Katya steps inside, but when she does her eyes are glassy and red. Katya can tell she's been smoking, and the thought of something familiar happening in someone else's life when her own feels so up in the air fills her with deep jealousy. "Oh, hey, man! I didn't think you were working today," Adore's voice has its usual gentle cadence that instantly soothes Katya's nerves, always has. Katya shrugs, scuffs the toe of her boot against the brick floor. "You okay?" Adore sets her phone face down on the counter and studies Katya.

"I told Trixie I love her this morning," Katya's voice sounds watery and she clears her throat, looks down at the deep white line etched into her boot by the unfinished brick, "I'm scared." She bites her bottom lip between her teeth, curses herself for ruining her lipstick before she remembers she hadn't put any makeup on at all before leaving Trixie's. She must look like crap. Her eyes dart up from the floor to Adore's face, to the thin line her painted lips are drawn into. She stays silent, stares at Katya with eyes that are rimmed with dark eyeshadow and have heavy false lashes set on top. They're so far from judging that Katya could cry. She does. "I'm so fucking scared," her hands are starting to shake where she has them pressed into the material of the hoodie that swallows her slim frame. She slides her arms around until they're wrapped around her body, watches two tears drop onto her sleeve.

Adore stands, walks past Katya to the door and flips the sign so it reads " _Sorry, we're closed_ " to anyone passing by. "C'mon," her voice is hushed when she places a hand in the small of Katya's back and leads her into the back room, to the couch where Katya first thought maybe she could love Trixie. Adore doesn't know that. She guides Katya to the middle, sits and hugs Katya's trembling body against hers. Katya lets herself cry; feel every fear and preemptively mourn the relationship she feels will end eventually.

She cries until her throat is hoarse and her face is stiff from drying tears. Adore is still holding her; palms rubbing soothingly over Katya's arm and back. She smells like weed and men's deodorant, one Katya thinks her dad might have used, and it's comforting in an incredibly foreign way. Katya takes another deep breath where her face is pressed into Adore's neck and draws back, sniffing and wiping her face with her sleeves. She doesn't speak, just reaches for Adore's purse and grabs her cigarettes. When her fingers tremble too much to open the pack, she passes it to Adore, watches her pull out two cigarettes and throw it back in the general direction of her purse. It misses. Adore lights them both, says, "talk to me," on an exhale. When Katya doesn't respond, Adore continues, "did she not say it back?"

Katya shakes her head, exhales down between her knees, "she did. I just," she stops, wets her lips and takes another drag, "I know it's not gonna last." She can feel tears streaking her face once again and she swipes her hand hard over her cheek, knows Trixie would scold her for how rough she's being with the tender skin near her eyes. "It didn't with Alaska," she says it and her voice cracks. She's tried so hard not to think about her since Trixie came crashing into her life; knows how she can be, how she _dwells_ until her mind is on a one way trip to another catatonic breakdown. There's a steady stream of tears rolling down her face. She ignores them.

* * *

_The sky outside was overcast and grey. The air felt too warm, heavy, for December; it was more like September again (thank God it wasn't September again). Three months had passed since they'd last seen each other, and Katya had been the one to ask Alaska to meet her. She picked a small coffee shop on the very edge of Williamsburg, one that was nearly always empty and the chance of running into someone they knew was slim. Katya was tucked away in the back corner of the shop drinking her second latte when Alaska arrived. The look on her face was despondent and her eyes were vacant when she found Katya's table. It made a knot form in Katya’s throat._

_Alaska was as pretty as ever; long blonde hair flowing past her breasts, tied half up into a messy bun on the top of her head and secured with a butterfly clip that Katya was almost positive Alaska took from her at some point when they were together. Her pink sweater looked soft, and Katya wished she could run her hands over it, feel Alaska's lithe body beneath the heavy wool and watch her hair lift with static when Katya pulls it over her head. She wanted to reach out and touch her face, brush away the eyelash clinging to her cheekbone and trace the pout of her lips._

_Katya wondered what Alaska was thinking. She'd been staring out the window, silently watching cars pass and a winter storm roll in since she had sat down. She never got a drink. Katya took a sip of the lukewarm coffee she'd been holding for the greater part of an hour, mumbled, "it's too bitter," and watched the shift of Alaska's eyes from the world outside to her face. She looked distant, still, and Katya felt a familiar longing wash over her. She wanted nothing more than to have Alaska reach out and grab her hand, tell Katya she was still in love, their months apart nearly killed her, and she was sorry. So sorry and she'd do anything to be able to take it back. She wanted to thread her fingers through Alaska's and tell her she never stopped loving her, that she still needed Alaska. She took a breath._

_"I still love you," it came out as a weak whisper, barely audible over the whirring of the espresso machine behind the counter. Alaska looked down at the table, to the sugar packets she had organized by color, and pushed the pink packet on one end closer to the blue one beside it. Her long red nails scraped against the table. When she looked back up at Katya, her lips were curved into a small smile but it didn't reach her eyes. "I can, um… I'll do anything," Katya felt her hands start to shake and she gripped the edge of the table, "please, Lasky." She tried to ignore the way her voice broke over her name._

_Alaska sighed quietly, and Katya wished more than anything that she could tear her eyes away from Alaska's. "I think about what I did every day, Kat. It wasn't right- leaving you that way. I hate myself for it, but I love her, you know? I'm in love with her." A tear fell onto Katya's cheek when she nodded. Sighing, she wiped it away with her sleeve. She was so tired of crying; tired of crying into her pillow every night and waking up with an aching headache that only served to remind her of Alaska, tired of friends calling, saying she still isn't the same and it’s time to move on. Alaska cleared her throat, said, "I have to go," and pushed herself out of the chair. Katya felt her heart drop again and watched Alaska walk through the shop. She didn't turn around when Katya called after her. It felt a lot like the world was ending._

_Katya cried on the train home; sobbed into her hand and did her best to ignore the stares cast her way by the midday commuters. She scrubbed her face with the sleeve of her sweatshirt, knew she left the skin raw and red, but didn't care. Nothing mattered. The stairs up to her apartment felt miles long, and she trudged up them slowly. She made it two feet inside the door before she felt bile creeping up her throat. She ended up on the floor of her bathroom that night, sobbing into a hand towel that she couldn't remember the last time she washed. She clutched an orange pill bottle tight in her palm, ran her thumb over the ridges on the side of the cap. She shook it hard and listened to the rattling pills inside. She never opened it._

* * *

Adore's hand cups the back of Katya's neck, massages the corded muscles there, "Trixie isn't Alaska." She says it like it's the most basic thing in the world, that somehow Katya had overlooked it, and maybe she had. Alaska was callow; full of childlike wonder and recklessness that Katya had been drawn to immediately, but had broken her heart in the end. If Trixie hadn't come along, Katya probably would've always held a flame for Alaska, wondered what would've happened if she had never met someone else, and would've gone back to her in a heartbeat if she ever came back. But Trixie; she's steady, sure and determined with fiery passion that fills Katya with both envy and pride at being on the receiving end of. She's nothing like Alaska. Not the Alaska that Katya remembers.

"She isn't," Katya takes a final drag from her cigarette, stubs it out in the ashtray on the side table. Adore sighs, slides her hand down to Katya's bicep and rests her head on Katya's shoulder.

"She said she loved you back."

Katya nods, "she did."

Katya lets herself back into Trixie's apartment at half past eight. She stayed at the flower shop until closing; lounged on the couch chain smoking cigarettes between restless naps and deciding that she was going to let herself jump in head first with Trixie, let go of her fears and just _feel_. Adore had begged Katya to eat a sandwich sometime around dinner, had sat on the couch beside her and ate her own while Bikini Kill played through the speakers her phone, giving Katya something to focus on other than replaying the conversation she had with Trixie earlier that day. They smoked a bowl and Adore didn't speak, didn't ask Katya why she was still at the shop or what she was going to do when she left, and Katya was once again thankful that Adore could read her so well. Katya didn't eat the sandwich. Her stomach growls as she walks down the narrow hallway to Trixie's bedroom and she ignores it, takes off the hoodie on her way into the bathroom and throws it on the floor with the other laundry that needs to be done.

Trixie's bathroom is all pink; the towels, the curtain, and the bathmat all various shades that perfectly match the framed prints of pin-up girls in bathtubs hanging on an otherwise blank wall. Katya's mind is foggy, on autopilot, as she removes the rest of her clothes and steps into the tub. She doesn't flinch when the water rushes over her in a steady, cold stream. She showers quickly; washes her hair with expensive shampoo and the body wash she could smell on Trixie that morning. It smells different when it's on her. She wraps herself in Trixie's robe, brushes her teeth and blow dries her hair until it's a mess falling over her face. She climbs into the middle of Trixie's unmade bed, snuggles down beneath the heavy blankets and soaks in the comfort the weight gives her. The lights are still on, but she dozes, thinks of Trixie and the future they might have together. She wakes when she hears Trixie calling her name, then Pearl's. She doesn't get a response from either of them. Katya keeps her face buried in the blankets and waits until the sound of Trixie's footsteps on the hardwood grows closer.

"Katya?" Trixie's voice is faint coming from the doorway. Katya recognizes the sound of Trixie removing her boots, then the blankets are lifting and bed is dipping in front of Katya, Trixie's perfume wafts over her as an arm pulls her close. "Baby girl," Trixie kisses the top of Katya's head, huffs a quiet laugh, "you smell like me." Katya knows Trixie is smiling, can hear it in her voice. She pokes her head out of the blankets and sees Trixie; her brown eyes, her freckles, her crooked teeth, and leans in for a kiss.

"I missed you," Katya whispers and she can feel Trixie's lips curve into a smile where they're pressed against Katya's chin. She feels close to tears; overwhelmed by the cycle of emotions she's been through in the last twelve hours, and shuts her eyes tight. Her fingers flex where they're trapped between her chest and Trixie's.

Trixie hums, presses small kisses to Katya's jaw, "yeah?" Katya nods, doesn't tell Trixie about her trip to the flower shop, the pack of cigarettes she smoked by herself, or that she hasn't eaten since the bowl of Cheerios with soymilk that she ate in Trixie's bed. Trixie's hand is rubbing slow circles down her spine, dipping low to the small of her back where the tie of Trixie's robe is digging into her skin, then back up between her shoulders. It drifts to the front of the robe, to the messy knot tied in the cotton, and Katya catches her wrist before she's able to loosen it.

"Not tonight, okay?" Katya's voice is weak like before, tiny bits of shame creeping up and settling heavy in her words. Trixie's hand falls away immediately, moves instead to tuck Katya's frizzy hair behind her ear. Her eyes are warm, kind. She smiles, and Katya's sure her heart is bursting in her chest; melting down over her lungs and dripping through her rib cage. She buries her head back in the blankets, rests her forehead against Trixie's collar bone. "I wanna stay like this," she mumbles and she can't be sure if Trixie heard her until she holds Katya tighter to her chest, whispers, "okay," and scratches her nails gently across Katya's back until she's falling back asleep.


	8. Chapter Eight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a little depressing backstory for your nerves!

Svetlana was a small woman; barely an inch taller than her daughter and petite enough to be mistaken for a child if you saw her from behind. Her silvery blonde hair was always curled, resting just above her shoulders, and her lips were always painted red. She prided herself on keeping a pristine home and raising a child that would have dreams and the means to follow them. She wanted the best for Yekaterina.

Svetlana knew Yekaterina was different from the very beginning. She was a handful as a child; exuberant and peculiar in ways Svetlana never knew exactly how to handle. She had rarely listened to directions, often ending up in trouble at school or in church. She asked so many questions, ones Svetlana didn’t have answers to, forcing her to go to the bishops of their church for guidance. The day she was six years old and asked with wide, innocent eyes why homosexuality was a sin, claimed it was love as pure as any, Svetlana cried. She always knew, deep down somewhere, that Yekaterina would be tempted. She turned to the bishops once more, fearing their judgement.

Svetlana prayed. She knelt at the foot of her bed and prayed for Yekaterina. She prayed He would give Yekaterina a true chance at life, that she would be _normal_. She saw those eyes looking up at her, every night. They were always so beautiful; so unlike Svetlana’s own or Yekaterina’s father’s. They were sea glass reflecting colors of the earth some days and the ocean others, tricky little things that were hard to pin down. Just like Yekaterina.

* * *

"Mama!" Katya's voice rings out through the foyer of the house and the door shuts behind her with a slam. She throws her backpack on the floor beside the coat rack, toes off her saddle shoes and sighs in relief when her stockinged feet were finally free from the sweaty leather. "Mama?" She listens closely for her mother, brows creasing when she doesn't get a reply. Her feet slip slightly on the oak floors in the narrow hallway to the kitchen. Her stomach was growling. She had been thinking of the package of Korovka wafers she'd hidden behind a bag of rice in the pantry since lunch. Her mother was seated at the kitchen table, head cradled in her hands, when Katya stepped through the arched doorway.

Svetlana doesn't acknowledge her daughter as she pulls a glass from a high shelf and pours herself a glass of milk. She looks up only when Katya grabs the cookies from the cabinet, but doesn't chastise her for spoiling her dinner like she normally would. Katya kisses her mother's cheek in greeting and plops down in the chair opposite her at the table. She wordlessly tears into the package, dunks a cookie in her milk, asks, "how was your day?" around a bite.

Svetlana sits up straighter, pulls a small black book from where it was resting on her lap and sets it on the table. Katya feels her stomach in her throat. "What is this, Yekaterina?" Her voice is thick with an accent that hasn't really faded despite all the years she's been living in America. Katya drops her gaze to her own lap, traces over the lines of her plaid skirt with trembling fingertips. Her mother had to know it was hers, her name was scrawled across the cover in sloppy cursive.

"My diary, Mama," Katya's voice wavered as she spoke. She could feel tears budding behind her eyes. Svetlana nods, and for the first time since Katya entered the kitchen, she notices the rosary clutched in her mother's palm. She takes in her bloodshot eyes and the places where her makeup had been rubbed off by a tissue. Katya's skin was crawling. Her mother knew.

Svetlana rises from her chair, one hand tightly wrapped around the diary Katya wished would burst into flames, the other around Katya's wrist. "Come." Katya is pulled up until she's standing, her mother's rosary pressing hard against her tendons and veins through pale skin. The shape of the cross would surly leave an indent. She follows her mother into the hall, up the stairs. A picture hanging over the landing catches her eye; a four year old Katya perched on her father's shoulders, her mother beside them with a hand on Katya's back to keep her upright. They were at the zoo, posing in front of the giraffe enclosure. They were always Katya's favorite animal. She knew things would never be like that again, that they hadn't been for a long time.

"Pyotr," her father looked up from his computer, at Svetlana as she pulled their daughter into the room. Katya's heart was racing and she couldn't bring herself to look up at the man on the other side of the desk. Her eyes stayed fixed on her feet, at the hole in her stockings with her big toe poking through. Her diary was dropped onto the desk and a chill ran down her spine. She wished the floor would swallow her whole.

"You think you are gay?" A tear rolls down Katya's cheek, catches in the collar of her polo. She stays silent. "Yekaterina!" Her father's palms slam down on the desk and he stands, "answer me!" His voice echoes through the room, makes goosebumps rise on the back of Katya's neck.

"Yes," she whispers, and it _hurts_. A sob comes from her mother beside her. She wants to reach out to her, comfort her, but she doesn't dare move. Her father crosses the room in long strides and Katya feels herself flinch when he reaches a hand up to her face. His calloused fingers grip her chin to lift her gaze, more gentle than she's ever remembered him being. "Papa—"

"You are not gay," he says the words slowly, each one with a pause as if he's drilling them into her head, "you will _not_ be gay." She feels his breath puff hot over her face, smells the alcohol and tobacco and tries her best not to flinch again. He releases her chin, places both hands heavy on her shoulders and begins to pray aloud. Katya's tears come harder, splashing over her shirt and into her breast pocket. She prays in her head; prays for nothing to change within herself, prays instead for her parents' acceptance. She doesn't think anyone hears her.

* * *

Katya starts a new diary that night, one she resolves to bring along with her to school when she decides that the chance of her teachers finding it is less scary than her parents. She doodles on the first few pages, pretty girls with long hair and short skirts, monsters resembling the gargoyles sitting on the shelf above her bed, and the gazebo at Old Harbor Park, before starting her first entry.

_May 1st: 18th Birthday_  
_May 25th: Graduation_  
_July 3rd-10th: New York with Alaska and Tati_  
_September 5th: Move in at Simmons_

She pauses for a moment before writing, _six months,_ in big block letters. She underlines it twice.

 


	9. Chapter Nine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> come say hi on tumblr! [@katyazeroni](https://katyazeroni.tumblr.com/)

Katya sways her hips to the riff Trixie is picking on her guitar, glances over her shoulder and smiles to herself before going into the next sequence of asanas. She presses her palms flat to the floor and kicks her legs up in the air as Trixie starts to sing.  _ Take a chance on my quadruple-leafed clover; it’s about to bloom. I’m going nowhere, I hope you join me soon. _

Katya tightens her core, visualizes her body in a vertical line. She sways, loses her balance and kicks her legs around in a circle to maintain her posture before she's planting her feet back on the ground.

They have no plans for the day; no shifts at the shop or restaurant, no commitments with friends. Katya had woken Trixie up at three in the morning, dead set on early morning sex, which Trixie vehemently argued wasn't a thing and begged Katya to let her go back to sleep until Katya's fingers were resting against her tongue and slipping past the waistband of her panties. They had stayed in bed for only three hours afterwards, pulling themselves away from each other when Katya's stomach was growling and Trixie's bladder was ready to burst.

"Let's take a trip somewhere," Trixie's stopped singing but her fingers are still strumming; four new chords over and over. One sounds out of place. Katya knows she's been working on something new, something Katya is starting to think might be about her because of the way Trixie smiles when she plays it. Katya's endlessly proud of her, can’t even begin to understand what it’s like to have so much talent stuck inside and begging to get out.

Katya wipes away the sweat beading above her eyebrows, plops down on the couch beside Trixie and nods. "Okay," she smiles, rests her cheek on the back of the couch and watches Trixie's fingers shift over the neck of her guitar, "where do you wanna go?" Trixie plays one last chord, shrugging while she sets the guitar down in the open case on the floor.

"I don't know. The beach, maybe?" She faces Katya on the couch, grabs one of her hands and laces their fingers together.

"That would be nice," Katya imagines Trixie laying out in the sand in her small yellow bikini, her breasts spilling out over the cups and her skin tan like it was when they first met. Katya would rub suntan lotion over her shoulders, her stomach, and kiss her beneath an umbrella planted in the sand.

"C'mon," Trixie pulls Katya up from the couch by her hand, kisses her cheek, "you start packing, I need to get some things from my place." She releases Katya's hand and picks up her guitar, makes her way to the front door with quick steps.

Katya laughs, shaking her head, "we're going now?"

"Yep!" Trixie grins, sliding her coat on. She's halfway out the door when she calls over her shoulder, "pack lots of layers, the beach is cold in January!"

Trixie rents a car and they make their way to New Haven, Connecticut; a place chosen completely at random from the paper map folded up messily in the glove compartment of the rented Subaru. The hour and a half drive takes them closer to two and a half hours because Katya insists they pull over every few minutes so she can take pictures of the snow covered trees and dark waves crashing up on the rocky shoreline. Katya puts on Grateful Dead and Trixie sings along with every song despite her protests when  _ Sugar Magnolia  _ started playing through the car speakers. Katya had faked a gasp, said, "my girlfriend is a Deadhead," with a delighted grin.

There's a small coffee shop just off highway where Trixie buys hot chocolates and cookies, and when the owner asks why they're visiting this time of year, Trixie just shrugs and says, "because we wanted to." The beach is deserted when they arrive, and they sit on the retaining wall that separates asphalt from sand, eat and drink in silence with their gloved hands clasped between them and watch the sky gradually darken as the sun sets behind them.

It's just after four and the puffy clouds are turning purple and blue like a storm is coming. Katya's standing out in the sand, staring at the nearly black waves and their white caps in front of her. Water splashes up around the ankles of her tall boots and she sighs heavy into the humid air, pulls her paper cup closer to her chest. Trixie wraps her arms around Katya from behind, presses a kiss to the side of Katya’s head. Katya swallows thickly, "when I was little my dad used to take me to the beach in the wintertime to watch the sunrise." Trixie hums, presses her face further into Katya's scarf. She doesn't continue, stays still instead and feels the warmth radiating from Trixie pressed against her back and the winter wind whipping across her face.

They rent a motel room close by and stay there for only one night. The sheets are scratchy against her skin, but Katya's positive she's never been more in love; with Trixie, with  _ life _ , and she hopes she gets to think that hundreds of times more. It starts to snow while they're eating breakfast in the small diner attached to the motel, big flakes that melt as soon as they land on the street. Katya shovels a forkful of syrup-drenched pancakes into her mouth, says, "I wish we could stay here forever," as she stares out the window. 

Trixie huffs a laugh over the lip of her coffee cup and shakes her head, "I wish you would swallow before you speak." Her eyes are teasing and Katya knows Trixie feels the same way.

Katya's finding it easier and easier to imagine a future with Trixie. Katya  _ wants _ a future with Trixie, a  _ real  _ one, realizes that marriage and kids might not be the worst thing in the world if that’s what Trixie wants. She can see them together in ten years, living in a small house in New England that Trixie insists on painting pink or lemon yellow, and Katya will fight her on it, but not hard enough to win. She wants a family with Trixie; wants to raise babies with her in the house they bought in the suburbs with a yard and a porch swing, wants to teach them to ride bikes in the cul-de-sac and grow up to change the world. She wants to grow old together, greying hair and wrinkles around their eyes from smiling too much, having more happiness than either one of them ever thought they'd have.

She reaches for Trixie's free hand across the table, runs her thumb gently over Trixie's rough knuckles, the skin that's threatening to crack and bleed in the cold air, "we should get going before the snow starts to stick on the roads." 

* * *

Katya lifts her head from its place between Trixie's thighs and can't help her grin. Trixie is blissed out; completely nude with her head pressed back against the headboard and her eyes closed, a joint dangling between her index and middle finger, dangerously close to getting ash on the sheets. She cracks an eye open, smirks down at Katya with glassy eyes, says, "you're not done yet, baby." She lifts the joint to her lips, inhales deep and exhales into the space between her and Katya. Katya can taste it in the air.

She digs her fingers into Trixie's ass just to hear her yelp over the droning voices of the podcast she's listening to. "C'mon," Trixie's free hand shoves Katya's face down to her cunt, smashes her nose against the bare fleshy mound above her clit. Katya doesn't know how long it's been; if the first episode of the podcast has ended and another one started somewhere in between Trixie's second and third orgasm, or if it's still the first.

Katya's completely at Trixie's mercy, would stay between Trixie's legs tasting her forever if she could. There are very few things Katya loves more than going down on Trixie, except maybe Trixie going down on her. She stiffens her tongue, circles Trixie's clit once, twice, before closing her lips around the nub and sucking hard. Trixie's fingers knot in her hair and she's pulling it hard, but Katya knows that doesn't mean stop to Trixie. She gets rough when she's close, scratches and bites Katya's skin, wraps her long fingers around Katya's throat and chokes her while she comes.

"Fuck, Kat," Trixie's body tenses up, tremors wrack through her body and Katya's head is still stuck between her legs. She wishes she could see Trixie come, loves the way her body shakes, the skin on her chest flushes, and her eyes roll back into her head.

Trixie pulls Katya's hair again, up this time, and Katya is straddling her hips. She licks around Katya's mouth, gathers her own wetness into her mouth. She doesn't kiss Katya, pulls back with a wicked smile instead and Katya just knows Trixie's not going to let her come. She doesn’t mind at all. Trixie sets the joint between Katya's lips, brushes her bangs from her forehead, "you did so good, baby, made me feel so good." Katya takes a long drag and blushes at Trixie's compliment. Her hand is still tangled in Katya's hair and she waits until Katya's set the joint in the ashtray and tugs once, hard as Katya exhales, and it turns into a moan.

"Please," her voice is small, and Trixie laughs at her, uses both of her hands to frame Katya's face. Katya grinds her hips down over Trixie's, plants her hands on Trixie's shoulders. She wishes she'd been able to get naked before Trixie grabbed her wrist and pulled her into the room.

"Think you can come before it's over?" Trixie's talking about the podcast, the two women talking about self-care and when it becomes selfish. It makes Katya want to laugh.

She nods her head as best as she can, whispers, "yeah. Yeah, I'm close," and Trixie laughs again. She taps Katya's hip with one hand, murmurs,  _ up _ , and moves so she's sitting up against the headboard with her legs crossed while Katya kneels on the other side of the bed.

She raises an eyebrow at Katya, says, "okay." Katya squeezes her eyes shut and moans loud when she understands what Trixie wants from her. She shoves her hand down the front of her leggings and rubs her clit hard and fast. Her fingers slip through the wetness, and she groans when she can't get enough friction. Trixie picks up her phone, checks the time left on the podcast.

"Three minutes, baby girl," Katya's eyes flicker open, up to Trixie's face. She looks indifferent, like Katya is nothing more than mindless entertainment for her. The thought sends a thrill through Katya and she's moaning again, leaning forward and bracing herself with her right hand on the bed, her fingers brushing Trixie's leg. She can feel her orgasm right there, heat building in her stomach, the base of her spine. Her thighs are shaking. She comes hard with a whine that's almost as embarrassing as it is to be getting herself off while Trixie watches.

She collapses forward as the voices stop, her fingers wrapping fully around Trixie's ankle. Her breaths are coming in short pants and she draws her hand out of her underwear. Trixie's foot twitches, nudging Katya's arm. She looks up to Trixie's face and she's smiling, looks like Katya's just professed her love to her all over again, and Katya has, kind of. She beckons Katya up with her hand, her fingers that Katya came thinking about inside her. "Such a good girl," the hoarseness in her voice triggers something inside Katya and she's in Trixie's lap again, kissing her deep with her tongue brushing the roof of Trixie's mouth, murmuring, "I love you so much," against her lips.

* * *

"Move in with me."

Trixie says it on a Tuesday while she's seated on the countertop in Katya's apartment, sipping on a glass of orange juice just after sunrise. Her thick thighs are spread out deliciously against the cheap laminate and it always drives Katya crazy when she sits that way; makes her want to dig her fingers into the soft flesh and cover her in bites and bruises before taking her time making her come. It's only the middle of May, but the air sweeping in through the open window is already humid, is making the hair at Trixie's temples curl and frizz. Katya keeps her head down, continues to fiddle with the knob on the stove for the burner that won't light.

"Did you hear me?" Trixie sets her glass on the counter, and Katya just knows she's going to leave it there, two inches of juice in the bottom of the glass left to settle and separate throughout the day in the heat of the apartment like she always does. Katya's told her to pour less but Trixie never listens.

"Yeah," Katya's head feels like it's still full of smoke from the cigarette she smoked ten minutes earlier out the bedroom window, "I heard." She turns, leans against the stove. Her hands are braced against the oven door behind her and when she looks up, Trixie's watching her. Katya pulls her bottom lip between her teeth and looks down to her toes. The white polish Trixie coated them in is chipping.

"Oh. Okay," Katya hears Trixie hop off the counter, her sweaty feet on the tile floor, then the sound of her glass hitting the bottom of the sink, "I get it." Katya digs her teeth harder into her lip, tastes blood sharp and metallic on her tongue.

"Trix," she sighs, runs her fingers through her hair and forms a ponytail, lets it go when she realizes she doesn’t have a hair tie around her wrist. Trixie shakes her head and starts toward the bedroom.

"No, it's fine," her voice is too calm and makes something twist in Katya's chest. She's peeling off her nightshirt, slipping on the shorts and tank top she wore the day before. Katya catches her wrist as she's shoving her pajamas into her backpack. Katya can feel Trixie's pulse hummingbird-quick against her fingertips. Trixie stops, doesn't look up at Katya, and  _ God _ , Katya wishes she would.

"Please let me talk," Katya whispers and waits for Trixie to say something, to pull her wrist from Katya's grip, "I'm so in love with you."

Trixie huffs out a breath and shakes her head, "then why don't you—"

"Trixie, please," Trixie sucks her teeth, finally looks up at Katya. She continues, "I love you, and I don't want to fuck that up." She slides her fingers from Trixie's wrist to her hand, squeezes it once, "I don't want to fuck up." Katya's words are stuck in her throat, getting swallowed up by the anxiety building in her chest.

"It's not always about what you want, Katya." Her words are bitter and all Katya can do is stare at her. Trixie's nose has a bump in the center; a small slope over the bridge that Trixie says she hates every time her glasses tilt to the left instead of sitting straight on her face. Katya loves it. She'll trace over the bump softly with her fingertips and tell Trixie it's perfect before pressing her lips against the pale freckles that cover it. She hates the bump. "Let go of me."

Katya does. She watches Trixie throw things into her backpack and doesn't say a word; not when she takes Katya's deodorant instead of her own, or when she forgets her pink paddle brush. Trixie doesn’t say goodbye when she leaves, says, "I don't think you can give me what I need, Katya. We're just wasting our time," instead and shuts the door so softly that Katya wishes she would’ve slammed it.

* * *

"Up, up, up," Jinkx's voice echoes through Katya's bedroom and she groans, rolls over and cracks open an eye. She catches a flash of Jinkx's coppery-red hair as she opens the curtains before Adore's face is fully blocking her view. She rests her head on Katya's pillow, the tip of her nose pressing against Katya's. Her eyes cross when she tries to look at Adore's face and she closes them instead; can smell cigarettes and cinnamon gum on Adore's hot breath.

Adore's hand wraps around Katya's waist, and the bed dips behind her. Jinkx's voice is soft beside her ear, "you need to get up, little bird." She feels Adore's fingers squeezing her side and it tickles, a little, but she doesn't laugh. She shrugs, keeps her eyes shut against the harsh afternoon light coming through the window and the gazes of her friends.

"We brought you food," Jinkx brushes Katya's hair behind her ear, scratches her fingers gently against Katya's scalp, "falafel from that place you like. Some flowers and crystals, too. It'll make you feel better."

Katya can feel tears pressing hard behind her eyes and she doesn't try to hold them in, knows she can let herself feel everything in front of Jinkx and Adore, just like she promised herself she would. A sob slips from her lips and she groans loud, guttural, half-screams  _ fuck _ in Adore's face, and she's pulling Katya in closer and kissing the side of her head, whispering, "it's okay," and, "let it out," against Katya's unwashed hair.

It's worse than it was with Alaska, Katya thinks. Worse than the heartbreak she was trying to avoid in the first place by not moving in with Trixie. Her heart feels like it's shattered in her chest; pieces poking out through her skin and leaving a bloody mess all around her.

She cries until the tears stop and she's gagging on every breath she takes. Adore is saying something, asking her a question, but all Katya can hear is her blood roaring in her ears. _ Sit up. _ The words finally register and she does with the help of Adore's hands under her arms. She hands Katya three red pills and a bottle of water, says, "drink that, you're probably dehydrated," when Katya tries to give the bottle back. Adore is staring at Katya like she's going to fall apart any minute now. She supposes that isn't too unlikely. She sips it slowly, feels every drop of cold water sliding down her throat until the bottle is empty and her stomach is growling at the promise of something to fill it that isn’t alcohol and cigarettes.

Jinkx and Adore coax Katya out of bed, into the living room where the ceiling fan is on and Jinkx has laid out a spread of food on the coffee table, around a tall vase filled with bright yellow yarrow and blue salvias. The sentiment isn't lost on Katya. Adore packs a bowl for them after they eat and they smoke in silence, passing Adore's pipe between the three of them until the bowl is filled with ash. Katya's reminded of Trixie's full lips wrapped around the glass and exhaling smoke into Katya's face. Her tears start to fall again, smattering dark grey over her shirt and she wants to scream at Jinkx and Adore to get the hell out, but she knows somewhere inside that they would never leave.

"Oh, little bird," Jinkx pulls a small pouch from her purse, reaches inside for a necklace strung with three crystals. Katya doesn't know what they are or what they mean, doesn't have the heart or energy to tell Jinkx that she doesn't care about them, either. Jinkx slips the black cord around Katya's neck and presses the cold stones against Katya's skin with the pads of her fingers. "Everything will be alright," her lips are downturned but her eyes are unwavering and strong. Katya believes her.

* * *

Katya quits her job at Beet & Yarrow. She does it in a text, sends a second immediately after saying  _ I can work until you find someone else, _ and waits for Jinkx's reply.

_ We'll be okay. I hope you are. _

She considers going to California, maybe. She wonders if the ocean is the same there. If it's as blue. If it will swallow her whole. She's never been west of the Smoky Mountains. She doesn't have much money saved; none, actually, and the thought of hitchhiking across the country doesn't bother her as much as it probably should.  _ Whatever happens, happens _ might not be the best attitude to go into it with. Her plan dies when she remembers that running away won't fix anything.

Katya wakes up feeling like she's dead. Foggy. Numb. It's the same way she's felt for the last five days (or is it six now?). She presses her hand to her chest, feels her heart thumping dully inside and wishes for half a second that it would catch up with her brain and stop. There are birds chirping outside, nesting in a tree beneath her window. She wishes they would stop too. She forces herself out of bed, manages to have a cup of tea and eat half of a banana. It’s better than the day before already. Her body aches; nights of restless sleep and lack of activity during the days catching up to her. She stretches out on the floor of the kitchen, lunges down low and stretches her arms as high as she can. Her muscles pull tight below her belly button and she winces. She folds over to grab her toes and resolves to get out of the apartment, even if it's just for a little while. She pulls on a pair of tight black leggings, a red sports bra, and her shoes, set on running herself out of her mood.

It's pouring outside. She hadn't even thought to check the weather before leaving. She remembers the night in April that Trixie brought Katya up to the roof of her apartment building; ten stories above the street to a small covered terrace with outdoor couches, a firepit, and tall tables. Katya had walked straight to the edge, into the rain, and leaned over the short cement wall. "It's so beautiful up here," she stared out at all the lights, at the apartments across the street, the bridge in the distance.

"It's raining, Katya," Trixie said it through a laugh and Katya spun around on her heel, looked at Trixie with a look that said  _ yeah, no shit _ , and reached out a hand to pull Trixie close. It had rained so much in the last year, and while she may have found it romantic at the time, Katya couldn’t help but wonder now if it meant something more. If she should've known it wouldn't last with Trixie because of the never-ending storms.

Katya runs anyway, allows herself to get soaked by the storm. She runs until she's in front of Adore's apartment in Bed-Stuy, staring at the black cast-iron gate enclosing the building's trashcans and the stairs up to the first floor. The gate slams closed behind her and she wrenches the heavy door open, takes the stairs two at a time to the second floor and pounds on the door. She hears faint yelling inside, Adore saying, "calm the fuck down," just on the other side of the wood.

Adore smiles when she sees Katya, but it quickly shifts to a frown. "Kat? You okay?" Adore steps back to allow Katya in, "did you call? I was on the phone with B." Katya shakes her head, flinging drops of water everywhere from her drenched hair; she hadn't been planning on coming over at all. Adore shuts the door with a soft click and walks into the living room, expecting Katya to follow her. She does.

Adore is in front of the couch, about to speak when Katya reaches her, frames her thin face with both hands and crushes their lips together. Adore makes a small noise, questioning, when Katya pushes her to sit on the couch. She tugs her soaked bra over her head and tosses it behind her, climbs onto Adore's lap and straddles her. Her shoes are digging into Adore’s thighs. "Katya, what—" She shushes Adore, closes her eyes and shakes her head.

"Just let me," Katya's voice breaks, she grabs Adore's face again, "please." She rubs her thumb along Adore's cheekbone, presses hard into the hollow of her cheek, "please."  _ I need to feel something. _ She doesn't say it to Adore, but it sounds like she’s begging in her head and she feels pathetic. Adore nods twice and her hand is on Katya’s lower back, pressing her closer and she's covering Katya's lips with her own. Katya runs her tongue over her lips, presses it in alongside Adore's.

The material of Adore's shirt is scratchy against Katya's nipples, turns them into pebbled nubs and she groans. She slides her hands back, twists them into Adore's thick hair. She doesn't pull, just tilts Adore's head back further and kisses her deeper. Adore's hands grip her hips and it isn't right. She isn't pressing bruises into Katya's hipbones, tugging Katya's body harder into her own the way Trixie did. She's too gentle. Katya ignores the tears that have started to streak down her face and hums low in her throat, grinds her hips down on Adore's thighs.

"Hey, hey," Adore's words are muffled against Katya's mouth and her hand is in the center of Katya's chest, pressing her backwards, "Katya, stop." Katya groans, and her tears keep falling, burning where they fall onto her bare chest. She looks at Adore and lets out a sound similar to the cry of a wounded animal, sags against Adore's chest and buries her face in her neck as she cries. Adore wraps a zebra print blanket around Katya, holds her close until she's gone silent and her tears have dried. 

"Talk to me," Adore's voice is soft, her fingers brushing over Katya's bare spine beneath the blanket. She sighs when Katya doesn't respond, "you gotta tell me something, man. Otherwise I'm gonna have to think that you actually wanted to fuck me." Katya laughs where her face is still pressed against Adore's neck. She sits up and everything spins. Her face feels tight.

Katya shrugs, "I dunno." She lifts herself up off of Adore's lap and settles on the couch beside her. She pulls her knees up to her chest, shrugs again. "I feel so empty without her," her hands start to shake and she digs her fingers into her knees, "I want to feel something." She stares at the wall across the room, pulls her bottom lip between her teeth. Adore reaches for Katya's hand and squeezes it in hers.

"You'll get past this," she says it with the most conviction Katya's heard coming from her, adds, "I know it's shitty now, but you will. You did it before."

Silent tears start to roll down Katya's cheeks. She sniffs hard, "this is what I was trying to avoid." Her head is throbbing and she feels sick. She feels like she's falling apart and being pieced back together at the same time. No one ever told her that was even possible.

Adore wraps her free arm around Katya's shoulders in a half hug, murmurs, "I know, babe." She releases Katya and climbs off the couch, grabs a hoodie from the back of the recliner in the corner and tosses it to Katya. "But put this on, okay? I can't focus with your tits out like that."

Katya laughs and pulls the hoodie over her head. She glances up to Adore, grins and says, "I would fuck the shit out of you, you know. You're hot as hell." 

* * *

Adore goes with Katya when she gets her first tattoo. Katya never asked her to, had only asked Adore who she would recommend for something simple and agreed when Adore offered to come. Katya's sketched out a dagger on the back of a bookstore receipt, and even though it's not perfect, it's exactly what she intends to get. She isn’t perfect; her lines are crooked and her shading doesn't always make sense either.

She sits back in the leather chair and watches the man etch dark lines into her hip. She imagines she can see each individual drive of the needle in slow motion and she wants more; wants to fill every blank piece of her skin until she's no longer a blank canvas and everywhere she looks is something Trixie was never a part of. It's petty but she feels like she's reinventing herself. Adore holds her hand the whole time, chats with her idly about the weather and a party at Bianca's the next weekend. 

* * *

"Babe! You came!" Katya is pulled through the door by an already tipsy Adore, into the house that's filled with people she doesn't know and music so loud she knows her head will be throbbing in no time. It's Katya's first time at Bianca's townhome in Park Slope, and she doesn't even want to think about how much it had cost or the mortgage Bianca pays on it. The modern exterior and stamped concrete floors tell her all she needs to know. She follows Adore to the kitchen, and there's smoke wafting through the hallway from the main room, the smell of weed and tobacco mixing together and making Katya's eyes burn. "Vodka or tequila?" Adore wiggles two bottles in the air and Katya points to the gold liquid sloshing around the bottle in her left hand. She watches Adore grab four shot glasses from the back of the marble countertop, splash some alcohol over the lip of the glasses as she pours. She pushes two toward Katya and she drinks them fast, feels the alcohol burning the back of her throat on the way down.

Katya loses track of Adore and how many drinks she’s had; bottles of beer blurring into shots and fruity drinks with umbrellas. She knows she shouldn't mix so many, but she takes every single drink that's offered to her. She decided it would be rude if she didn't. She makes friends with a woman, Kameron, and she has to explain to Katya three times what exactly she does for a living before Katya gives up trying to understand her and nods anyway. She has a sweet accent, sort if similar to Trixie's, and if Katya closes her eyes when Kameron speaks over the music, she sounds almost like her. They smoke on the patio outside and dance together in the middle of the room, and Katya thinks it's the living room but she can't really tell because there are so many. She wraps her hands around Kameron’s waist and sways with her to the music that's blasting through the speakers until her husband appears beside them, asking to cut in.

Katya sees Bianca across the room; notices the way her features soften considerably and she focuses only on Adore when she wraps her arms around the older woman's waist. Katya doesn't understand their dynamic, not even a little bit, but she’s never been more sure that they love each other. It's written all over Bianca's face when she watches Adore dance and hidden inside Adore's words when she's drunk and carrying on about how wonderful Bianca is. Katya hopes it's something that's built to last.

She grabs another beer and wanders around the house, through the bedrooms on the second floor until she finds the master. She stares at the huge four-poster bed and can just tell Bianca's done some kinky shit on it, probably with Adore. She laughs to herself, takes a sip from the brown bottle and imagines the bed in her room, taking up 90 percent of the floorspace and leaving no room for a nightstand or anything else.

She finds the bathroom, and after searching for the light switch she stares at her reflection in the mirror. Her head spins in the harsh lighting. It's hard to focus, but she has bags under her eyes; her irises framed by bloodshot whites and messy blue eyeliner. She closes the door with the heel of her boot and pulls her phone from her back pocket. She calls Trixie on reflex, swallows hard against the lump in her throat. It rings three times before going to voicemail.  _ Hey, it's Trixie! I'm sorry I missed your call, but I'll get back to you as soon as I can! _

"Fuck," Katya slides down the wall and draws her knees up to her chest, sets her beer on the tile floor, "Trix, Trixie, baby, it's Katya. I, uh," Katya knows she's slurring her words. She clears her throat. "I'm at a thing, a party at Bianca's. You remember her? She's Adore's… Somethin'. Sugar mama," she laughs and her eyes sweep over the room; to the freestanding clawfoot tub beneath the window, the wainscoting, and the teak wood in the shower, "God, she's loaded. You'd love this place, baby." Katya can feel tears streaking down her cheeks, takes three deep breaths, "I miss you."

She wipes her tears away with the back of her hand, "I wanna explain, okay? I have to because you're… Everything." She has a knot in her throat that she can't swallow around, "I wanna have everything with you for the rest of my life, okay?" She faintly hears Adore calling for her, Bianca's laugh not far behind, "I gotta go. Um, call me back? Please. I love you." Katya ends the call and rests her forehead against her knees. She wishes Trixie was beside her, imagines she's scratching Katya's back the way she likes and singing softly into her ear.

"Kat? You pass out in there?" Adore laughs on the other side of the door, knocks twice before opening the it herself. She crosses the room and kneels down on the floor across from Katya, puts a hand on her shoulder, "are you gonna be sick?" Katya nods against her jeans and allows Adore to help her to the toilet. She slides a hair tie from her wrist and pulls Katya's hair up into a bun on the top of her head. She rubs her palm in the center of Katya's back as she retches into the bowl, and it still isn't right, but Katya decides it's better than nothing.

 


End file.
